


The Buy In

by dracusfyre



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, BAMF Tony Stark, Detective Bucky Barnes, M/M, Mob Boss Tony Stark, Police Brutality, Socialism, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:14:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 23,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26365546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dracusfyre/pseuds/dracusfyre
Summary: For theImagineTonyandBuckyprompt:Mafia AU with Tony as the Boss (except he's a really good one, making the streets safe, keeping drugs away from kids etc) and Bucky as the detective sent to go undercover to catch him out but ends up realizing he's actually doing more good than harm and they end up falling in love
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Tony Stark
Comments: 152
Kudos: 743
Collections: alphabet's marvel favorites





	1. Fresh Meat

**Author's Note:**

> As I wrote this I realized that I was writing a self-indulgent socialist utopia with a veneer of WinterIron on top. #sorrynotsorry. 
> 
> _klichka_ = Russian mafia phrase meaning nickname, but specifically for a criminal figure  
>  _patsani_ = low level street tough  
>  _krishna_ = literally "roof," but used to mean protection provided by someone powerful or politically connected

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is completely written and a new chapter will be posted daily!

“Hey, boss, we got fresh meat for you,” the man at Bucky’s elbow said. Bucky’s heart was in his throat, pulse racing like mad; he was the first detective ever to get this close to Tony Stark, to the Mechanic, and he prayed he would live to tell the tale. For years Stark had only been seen through the lens of a telescoping camera, impeccably dressed with sunglasses hiding his eyes and surrounded by his men at all times. Before today there had been no wiretaps, no informants, no insight into the elusive mob boss and his inner circle. But after years of hard work, Bucky was about to change that. As he was pushed into the echoing warehouse, his eyes darted around the room, taking in the classic cars, the souped-up sports coupes and half-built engines, looking for the man himself. Bucky wondered how many of these were stolen and awaiting new buyers. Men in suits were spread out guarding the exits, but he didn’t see a desk or an office, any kind of throne from which Stark ran his criminal empire.

After a moment, in the middle of the room, a man that Bucky’s eyes had completely glossed over unfolded himself from a work bench. He was wearing a tank top and low-slung jeans, and as he stood, he pulled his welding mask off and put down the butane torch. Bucky blinked, stunned as he approached; the man’s hair was tousled and messy, jaw dark with a five o’clock shadow, arms toned and tan. His eyes, when they met Bucky’s, where whiskey brown and warm with amusement. Bucky barely kept his jaw from dropping as he recognized Tony Stark, right down to the scar on his jaw he’d gotten in the car crash that had killed his parents.

“New meat, huh?” Stark asked, and he crossed his arms over his chest as he tilted his head and studied Bucky with eyes that seemed entirely too perceptive. “Tell me about him.”

“Wants a job,” the man at his elbow said. Bucky didn’t jump, but it was a near thing; he’d forgotten the man was even there. _This_ was Tony Stark? The Mechanic was actually a _mechanic?_ Everyone, from Bucky's fellow policemen to the FBI task force that had been organized to take him down, to the ATF agents and federal marshals that swapped stories over beer, had a different theory about where the man’s _klichka_ came from: because of his well-known penchant for nice cars, because shop tools were his favorite methods of interrogation, because he was good at greasing wheels and making things happen. No one had ever suggested, even as a joke, that it might be because the man was a grease monkey. “Former military, spent time in Iraq,” the man continued. What was his name? Oh yeah, Harold. Everyone called him Happy. “Got out and a friend of a friend got him a job, if you know what I mean. His info checks out; he used to do work down at Brighton Beach then moved up to Red Hook before crossing the bridge. You said we needed new muscle down on 6th, remember?”

“I remember.” Stark pulled out a wrench that had been hanging from his belt and started flipping it from hand to hand as he considered Bucky thoughtfully. Bucky lifted his chin and met Stark’s eyes, hoping his nervousness didn’t show; this wasn’t his first undercover assignment, just the one with the highest stakes. Stark controlled most of Manhattan and had been successfully expanding his territory at the expense of the Russians and Irish and gangs from Harlem. As the silence stretched, the metal of the wrench flashed in the light from the windows as it rose and fell, his hands sure and steady. “Go away, copper,” Stark said finally, and Bucky gaped as Stark turned away.

“I’m not a cop,” Bucky protested to Stark’s surprisingly muscled back. This operation, his job, maybe even his life depended on convincing Stark he wasn’t a cop. “Look, this is the biggest outfit in the city and I just want a paycheck, ok? My last boss came up short and ran back to Armenia without paying his debts. Word is you always pay up.” 

“Sure you do,” Stark said, the corner of his mouth turning up. “We all just want a paycheck, right? Happy, remind me why we need muscle on 6th?”

“Cops have been hassling our people,” Happy said, taking a step away from Bucky and eyeing him with suspicion. “Trying to shake’em down, demanding a cut.”

“Right, right.” Stark picked up his welding mask but didn’t put it on. “What’s your name, copper?”

“I’m not-“ When Stark just raised an eyebrow and gestured like _get on with it,_ Bucky said, “Jason. Jason Brooks.”

“That’s it? No street name?”

“My friends call me JB sometimes, but that’s it.”

“Alright, Blue Eyes,” Stark said as he pulled his mask back down over his eyes and fired up the torch again with a hiss of blue-white heat. “Get the cops to lay off my people, and you’ll get your paycheck.”

Happy put a hand on Bucky’s back and shoved him back out the door of the warehouse since they’d been dismissed. “That’s it?” Bucky said, bemused.

“Yeah, that’s it. Whaddya want, to provide a resume and cover letter? It’s not like the Boss has to check with HR here.”

“Does he really think I’m a cop?”

Happy shrugged. “Only the boss knows what the boss thinks. Guess not if he said you could stay. Come back tomorrow at 5.”

* * *

“Do you really think he’s a cop?” Rhodey asked when Tony was done welding, coming over to admire the smooth bead he’d put on the chassis of the classic car he was remodeling.

“Oh, he’s definitely a cop,” Tony said, stretching his back and shoulders. “But then I thought, we have a cop, we have cop problems, let’s let one take care of the other. Either he’ll get them to back off, or he won’t, but either way one of my problems will be solved.”

“Oh, so it’s not because he has a pretty face?”

“I didn’t know you were on the market, platypus,” Tony said with wide eyes. “I’m sure I could get his number for you, along with his bank account, social security number, and entire relationship history.” When Rhodey just rolled his eyes, Tony grinned. “He did have a pretty face, though, didn’t he? I wonder if that’s why they sent him.”

“Not unless the feds have changed their MO in a big way,” Rhodey said, handing Tony a towel to clean his hands and wipe the sweat off his face and neck.

“I’ll let him run around a bit and see what happens,” Tony said, voice turning serious. “I’ve got a good feeling about this one.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Like I had about Natasha. Or Natalie, whatever she’s calling herself now.” Natasha had been a plant from the Russians, trying to crack his operations so they could retake some blocks they’d lost a few years ago when Tony had taken advantage of infighting to push his boundaries out. She’d taken one look at the ladies working in Tony’s territory and taken to them like a mother cat with kittens. She’d also organized them with the ruthlessness of any NY City union boss, eliminating pimps with such prejudice it earned her the nickname the Widow. Six months into working for him, she’d flipped and given him everything she knew and was the reason why the Russians had been pushed back to their tiny toe-hold in Brighton Beach, with most of them heading back for greener territories back in the Motherland. “Put him with KT. He’s good with newbies.”

“You aren’t worried he’s going to find something?”

Because it was Rhodey, Tony gave it some thought. Whatever law enforcement sent Blue Eyes had apparently done a better job with his cover than the previous people did; so far Happy had been able to weed them out pretty early on. Tony couldn’t even say why he was getting a cop vibe from the new guy. He had short hair, little longer than military regulation, but the stubble on his jaw screamed six-day bender and he had the thousand-yard stare of an ex-soldier used to violence down pat. Hell, that part was probably true. Maybe it was the surprise in his eyes when he’d seen Tony; in Tony’s experience, most people who made their living on the streets had the ability to be surprised burned out of them long ago. “Nah,” Tony said eventually. “For the good stuff, he’d have to go through me. Anything else he’d just be nibbling around the edges.”

“Whatever you say,” Rhodey said with a shrug. 


	2. Taking out the Trash

“So who exactly are these cops hassling?” Bucky asked the next day as he met up with a man called Kenton at a bodega on 6th. “The shops? Dealers?”

“The ladies,” Kenton 'call me KT' said, shoving his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. KT was stocky and short, with an aggressive undercut and stud in his lip, looking more like an emo kid than a mob enforcer. “We don’t have dealers here.”

“Really? None?" When KT nodded, Bucky asked, "How come?”

When KT eyeballed him skeptically, Bucky said, “Look, it’s my first day, alright? I’m not from around here.”

“Everyone knows the boss hates drugs,” KT said, hitting the button for the crosswalk. “Like, _hates._ A few years ago he tried to run all the dealers out, but they kept coming back like weeds. Too much demand to keep them out for long, you know? So the boss figures, you don’t kill weeds by cutting them down, you kill them at the roots. So he started targeting the users, not the dealers. First, he bought up the local methadone clinic, set up a rehab house nearby, brought in a bunch of fancy docs. Puts the word out that anyone who wants to dry out can stay for free and gets a sweet deal when you get your ninety-day chip.”

Bucky frowned. “I remember that. The mayor cut the ribbon on the facility, right? I thought the city set up that clinic.”

“Ha!” KT said it like that, an actual _ha._ “The boss let them take credit for it, sure. But it was his idea and his money. Once he got the clinic up and running, he put the word out to all the dealers, making them an offer: sell him all your goods, give him your client list, and you get a new job that pays twice what dealing does.”

“What happens if the dealer doesn’t take the offer?”

“One day they find themselves on a cargo ship to Madagascar,” KT said, matter of fact. “Or Indonesia, or Kamchatka.” Bucky doubted that but kept it to himself; it was way more likely that the dealers got dumped in the river while Stark’s organization sold the drugs at a markup. But it was a good story. “Stoners can stay if they grow their shit locally,” KT continued, “but the party bros looking for bumps gotta get it somewhere else. But God help them if they make trouble, because the boss sure won’t.”

“Huh,” Bucky said, noncommittal. “So what are we doing today? Waiting for the cops to show their faces again?”

“Pretty much. Gonna talk to the ladies, then we’ll hang around and see if the pigs come back and let them know that their behavior is not appreciated.” A few more blocks down, KT knocked on an unassuming red door and led Bucky into a whole new world. He’d known when KT said _ladies_ that he’d meant prostitutes and had braced himself for the worst: bare mattresses on the ground, barred windows, dull eyes and needle tracks. But what Bucky walked into looked more like the Waldorf than any brothel Bucky’d ever seen during his brief tour on Vice. Bucky tried not to stare as he took in the thick carpet and tasteful furnishings around the room, with women scattered around in groups chatting. Along one side of the room was a classy bar with mahogany wood and brass furnishings that had a few customers already despite the fact it was barely 5:30. KT approached the bartender, a petite but statuesque redhead with pinup curls wearing a corset that had, if Bucky’s eyes weren’t deceiving him, knives where the boning would be.

“Evening, Widow,” KT said, and the bartender gave him a grin as she slid a beer to the man across from her.

“Evening, gents,” she said, voice pure Georgia drawl. “So did the Iron Man himself send someone down to check on his chickadees?”

“Iron Man?” Bucky echoed in confusion. “You mean the Mechanic?”

“You must be new,” she said with amusement, and KT nodded. “He’s got lots of names, honey. He likes getting them and giving them. Bet he gave _you_ a name, didn’t he?” she said, crossing her arms and leaning on the bar to give him an appreciative once-over. The pose made her look like she was going to spill out of her corset; didn’t do a thing for Bucky, but behind them the man with the beer walked into the back of a couch. “What does he call _you_?”

Ridiculously, Bucky felt his ears get hot. “Blue Eyes,” he said. “Probably like Jimmy Blue Eyes, I guess, but I don't know why. My name's not James.”

“It’s cuz of them pretty blue eyes of yours,” Widow said, and she laughed as Bucky felt the flush spread to his neck. “He must have taken a shine to you.”

“We're here about those cops you mentioned,” KT cut in, giving her cleavage a glance of appreciation but staying all business. “Stop teasing the help and give us the rundown.”

Widow gave Bucky another sultry smile and stood up straight. As she picked up a glass and rag and started polishing, the Georgia peach act fell away; her movements going from languorous to brisk. “Like I said to the boss, it was Rumlow and Rollins again,” she said, and Bucky’s eyebrows went up as even the accent disappeared. “They must think they got a pretty strong _krishna_ to keep coming around here. They’ve got some of the new girls rattled. Came in just the other night trying to get a 'law enforcement discount,'" she said with a sneer, "and the only way we got them out of here without violence is Hawkeye got them too drunk to know if they were coming or going.” Widow tilted her head towards a man at the far end of the bar who looked like he was passed out, hat drawn down low over his eyes. “I wouldn’t have asked for backup if they weren’t cops, but.” She shrugged, and Bucky understood. Low level _patsani_ , or even higher level enforcers, could disappear, but not a cop. “They also wanted a cut of what we pay to the Boss and wouldn’t listen when I tried to tell them it didn’t work like that.”

“What do you mean?” Bucky asked. "Doesn't work like what?"

Widow and KT shared a look. “He’s new,” he reminded her, and Widow smiled.

“Around here you don’t pay up, you buy in,” she said. “You’ll see.” She stepped away to take an order before Bucky could ask another question, so he turned back to KT.

“What are we going to do about the cops when they show up?” Bucky asked. Most times dirty cops got away with shaking down illegal businesses for money because it’s not like a bunch of criminals were going to rat them out to Internal Affairs. “Ask politely?”

“I have a few ideas,” KT said, sounding unconcerned. Bucky waited for him to say something else, but he apparently didn’t seem like sharing, so Bucky grunted and turned to scan the lounge.

While they’d been talking, a few more men, johns, Bucky assumed, had trickled in and were in conversation with the women, each of which were giving every indication that the man they were sitting next to was the funniest and most interesting man in the world. Guess that was one appeal of this place, Bucky thought; a man would never strike out here, and they probably spent good money to maintain the illusion that they were getting laid on their own merits. “Are all of the Boss's brothels like this?”

KT looked around like he was seeing the place for the first time. “Yeah,” he said, lifting one shoulder carelessly. “Boss invests in his people.”

Bucky supposed that made sense. Better margins in higher end prostitution. Still, it was strange to feel like he was hanging out in a hotel bar, complete with tipsy-looking couples disappearing into elevators to hook up. It was after 9 when the cops showed, still, stupidly enough, in uniform. Bucky suppressed the urge to curl his lip in disgust; these guys represented everything Bucky hated about his job, full of arrogance and spite and a thinly veiled hunger for violence. They were bullies, pure and simple, and Bucky hoped he would have a chance to punch one in the face. He could get away with it, too, if he told his superiors it was necessary to maintain his cover.

KT saw them the same time Bucky did; as they came closer to the bar, he slid off his barstool and put himself in their path.

“Who are you supposed to be?” The lead one sneered, looking down at KT, who was a good six inches shorter than the officer. “Are you supposed to be protecting these whores? _You?_ ” Bucky came up behind him to back him up and read the officer’s badge. Rumlow. He memorized his badge number and that of the second officer, Rollins.

“Welcome back, officers,” KT said with a faint smile. “How can we help you?”

“Last time we asked nicely for our money, and we didn’t get it,” Rumlow said, coming closer so he was looming over KT. “We also asked for some trade, and didn’t get that either. We’re not going to ask nicely again.”

“Let me buy you a drink,” KT said, taking a step backward and gesturing towards the bar. “And let’s have a conversation, yeah?”

“We’re not here for no fucking conversation,” Rumlow spat. “We’re here for our money and a good lay, not necessarily in that order.”

“Fine.” KT’s friendly tone disappeared and his posture changed, going from relaxed and open to a coiled, snakelike tension, ready for violence. Bucky had seen that stance before, in his hand to hand combat training class at the academy. “We’ll cut to the chase.” Widow was watching them intently, a throwing knife already in her hand. Movement out of the corner of his eye proved that the man, Hawkeye, wasn’t as passed out as he appeared to be; Bucky could see light reflecting off the barrel of something, aimed at Rumlow. “For you to be coming in here like this, swinging your dick around, two things gotta be true: you must have protection, some fish big enough that you aren’t afraid of the Mechanic, and that big fish knows you’re here and doesn’t care. If that’s the case, then _your_ boss and _my_ boss are going to have problems. But if either of those things is _not_ true, you are in a world of shit.”

At that, Rollins stole an uneasy glance at Rumlow, who was still trying to stare down KT. It was quick, but it gave the game away – and KT knew it, because suddenly he smiled and relaxed, which made Rumlow scowl harder. “Busted,” he said. “It’s not going to be hard to find out who your protection is, officers. And I don’t think they are going to be happy that you are picking fights with the Mechanic. Am I right?”

“Fuck you,” Rumlow snarled, and swung at KT. But the smaller man was ready, and KT stepped to one side of the swing, then grabbed Rumlow’s wrist and pulled at the same time that he put a hand on the back of his head and shoved, sending the man stumbling. Textbook judo move, to Bucky's eyes. As his partner got his feet under him again, Rollins went for his gun but Bucky already had his hand on it, shoving back down into its holster.

“Let’s keep it a fair fight,” Bucky said in a low voice, and Rollins listened because Bucky’s other hand had a knife slid up under the bottom edge of his bullet proof vest.

“Don’t make this any worse than it already is,” KT was saying, Rumlow’s face bright red with fury. “The Boss will let bygones be bygones if you leave now and don’t come back, but if blood gets shed...” He shook his head.

Rumlow’s face was red and Bucky could tell that he was furious at having been humiliated by someone smaller and lighter than him. Bucky was afraid that he would go for his pistol, but instead he put his hands up like he was in a boxing ring. KT smiled faintly and just made a “come here,” gesture, and that’s when Bucky knew he was trying to piss him off. And it worked; Rumlow lunged, swinging with a tight haymaker that would easily have broken KT’s jaw.

If it had connected, that is. But instead of trying to block, KT dropped to one knee, ducking under the swing, and hit Rumlow in the dick with an elbow as he scooped his leg and stood, throwing Rumlow to the ground where he curled around himself, cursing incoherently with pain.

Bucky whistled long and low, smothering a laugh. KT laid that asshole out in seconds. He released Rollins and said, “You can have your turn now, if you want.”

“That’s assault on an officer,” Rollins snarled, trying to help Rumlow to his feet. “I should haul you down to the station for that.”

“Your buddy clearly started it,” Bucky said. “It’s not like you don’t have witnesses. I’d get out of here before he does anything worse.” Bucky didn’t know if it was the fact that Rumlow still couldn’t stand up straight or the way that everyone was staring at them, but Rollins seemed to know good advice when he heard it, because they did leave, shouting threats the entire way.

“Did you get all that?” KT called out after the door slammed shut behind them, heading back to the bar where the Widow’s knife had disappeared like she’d never drawn it in the first place.

“Every second,” Hawkeye rumbled, sitting up. The barrel that Bucky had seen was a high-end camera lens, not a gun; he’d been videotaping the whole encounter. “Uploading it to YouTube now. That should get them off the streets for a while.”

“ _That’s_ how the Boss likes to settle things,” KT said with satisfaction. When he noticed Bucky looking at him with confusion, he said, “Listen here, because this is important: the Boss doesn’t like us to kill people. We don’t do this whole ‘send our guy to the hospital, we send your guy to the morgue’ thing, got it? We send them to the poorhouse. The poor bastard gets so tied up in lawsuits, repossessions, revoked passports, suspended licenses, and investigations that he wishes he were dead. Then the Boss goes after the poor bastard’s boss, and that boss’s boss…mobsters, dons, whatever you want to call them, they don’t mind dying, but they never, _ever_ want to be broke. You start threating their bottom line and they pay attention.”

“Seriously?” Bucky said skeptically. Stark’s file said that he had plenty of blood on his hands.

“Seriously. You might get a pass if you don’t start it, but if it happens again, he cuts you loose, and believe me, it doesn’t take the cops long to track you down. They are hungry for anything they can get on the Boss.”

“You don't say,” Bucky said blandly. "So now what do we do?"

"We're going to stick around until the ladies close up shop, make sure those two don't get any bright ideas to circle back." KT pulled out his phone and started typing in it as he got back on his barstool where the ice in his drink had barely had time to melt. "Hawkeye usually makes sure the clientele behave themselves, so you can have a drink, but don't proposition any of the ladies while you're working."

"Right." What a strange goddamn way to run a criminal enterprise. After a moment, Bucky took a seat beside him and accepted a drink menu from the Widow, whose mouth was curling like she could read Bucky's thoughts. 

"You'll get used to it, Blue Eyes," she said. "I got a good feeling about you."


	3. Puzzle Wrapped in an Enigma

On the way back home after the brothel closed, Bucky logged into Discord and dropped into a channel labeled only with random numbers and letters. _First day of work was :thumbs up:_ _but there were two dudebros who tried to jam up my shit. Wish they would back off,_ he wrote. The channel was monitored 24/7 in case of emergency or actionable intel.

He waited as the dots danced, then his police handler wrote, _that sucks. who are they?_

Bucky typed the last four of Rumlow and Rollins’ badge numbers and put his phone back in his pocket. This operation was way more important than those two swinging dicks; between the video from tonight, which was going to be a PR nightmare for the department, and his request, Rumlow and Rollins better be manning a desk for the foreseeable future.

He was pulling out his keys to his apartment building when he heard a car door opening nearby. His head whipped around and his other hand was already on the pistol in the holster at the small of his back when he heard, “Whoa there Blue Eyes,” in a familiar voice. The figure that stepped out of the car held his hands up and stepped into the light. “Hard day at the office?”

“I’ve had worse,” Bucky said warily.

“How’d everything go today?” Stark shoved his hands in his pocket and leaned against his car, the streetlight casting harsh shadows on his face.

“Fine. Didn’t KT give you a debrief?”

“Yeah, I heard his side. I wanna hear your side.”

Bucky thought about it, wondering if he should put a shine on it or be honest. “KT and Hawkeye’s play tonight was clever and would have worked perfectly against a different set of cops. But I think those two won’t give up until they get back at the person who embarrassed them. Might have made more problems than they solved.”

“Yeah?” Stark tilted his head to the side thoughtfully. “You sure about that? KT's been on the job for a few years now and thought it was a good call. It's your first day and you saw the cops for all of fifteen minutes.”

Bucky shrugged. “I’ve met guys like them before. Don't strike me as the type to know when they're beat. Best thing would be for them to be encouraged to take a long walk off a short pier.”

Stark made a thoughtful noise. “But KT explained office policy on that?”

“Yeah. Only as a last resort.” Bucky tried to sound neutral, but something of his skepticism must have bled through.

“You don’t agree?”

The note in Stark’s voice put Bucky on high alert. _Higher_ alert, since his heart was still racing from before. “I get the logic, it’s just…different,” Bucky said. “Makes sense though. Bodies attract attention.”

“Is that the only reason you think it's a good policy?” Stark asked neutrally.

Bucky hesitated. He got the feeling there was a right and wrong answer to this and wished this conversation had happened six hours ago when he was less tired. “Killing people changes things,” he said finally - honestly - hoping he wasn’t about to touchy-feely himself out of this operation. Between the military, the police, and then undercover work with organized crime, he had been so steeped in machismo that it had become second nature – to those guys, life was one big dick measuring contest - but Stark didn’t seem to work like that. Or at least, he didn't want people to think he worked like that. “Not just changes people, but like…it sends a message to everyone else. ‘This is what a life is worth.’” Bucky took a deep breath and let it out slowly, forcing himself to maintain eye contact with Stark. “People respond to that. Makes them…mean. Hard. So if you can avoid that...” He ran a hand over the back of his neck, feeling like an idiot. He probably sounded ridiculous. “So, yeah. Anyway. Guess if it ain’t broke don’t fix it, right? Seems to be working for you.”

“We do alright,” Stark said slowly, and Bucky figured he must have said the right thing because he straightened and held out a hand for Bucky to shake. Bucky looked at it with surprise and took it, feeling acutely aware of the strength of Stark’s grip and the callouses on his palms. “Welcome aboard.”

* * *

Tony got back in his car as Blue Eyes continued into his building, cranking it and pulling away from the curb on autopilot. If Blue Eyes hadn’t been a cop, Tony would have told himself that he was too good to be true; as it was, Tony wondered if it was possible that the police or feds or whoever had profiled him well enough to give “Brooks” a gold plated script to work from. But it hadn’t felt like the new guy was playing him tonight; his comments had been too rambling and inarticulate to have been prepared in advance. Rhodey was going to think he was an idiot, but he really though Brooks was being honest with him tonight, which had the potential to change things.

At the first stoplight, he pulled out his phone and texted Rhodey.

_I like him._

Rhodey sent a rolling eyes emoji almost immediately. _Blue Eyes?_

_Yeah I want to keep him. he’s wasted as a cop._

The three dots must have started and stopped a dozen times; Tony was almost back to his own place when he finally got a response. _You’re playing with fire._

Tony smirked. _I know_ , he wrote back. _It’s what I do._

_Yeah, but this time, if you get burnt, we all do._ Tony pulled into his private garage and turned off the car, listening to the engine tick as it cooled. Rhodey was right. As much as he was intrigued by Blue Eyes, he couldn’t put his people at risk by tugging on that thread. “Dammit,” he said out loud, scowling as he got out of the car. “Ten years ago I wouldn't have thought twice.”

* * *

A few weeks into the operation Bucky and KT were making the rounds, checking in with the businesses and people on their beat, and Bucky was suddenly struck by two things: one, just how much this gig felt like being a street cop, walking the sidewalks just observing the neighborhood; and two, how no one was ever this happy to see him when he was a street cop. People saw KT and more often than not, they were smiling, chatty about business and local gossip. Most of them greeted Bucky (“Oh, this must be Blue Eyes,” which had yet to stop making Bucky’s ears burn) and were happy to introduce themselves. The ones that weren’t smiling were the ones that had something to complain about: permit not going through, shipment delayed, broken equipment that insurance wasn’t paying out for. KT took notes, nodded and commiserated, and when they left almost everyone looked at least mollified, if not cheered.

“You know, for us playing the bag men today, we sure aren’t picking up any money,” Bucky commented. A couple of times KT had taken a store owner to the side and Bucky, straining his ears, heard something about loans; these people always had the look of someone explaining why they couldn’t pay but it wasn’t their fault, honest. Like everything else, KT made notes and listened politely.

“That’s not what we’re doing,” KT said. “This is check in. We do it every two weeks or so. Money stuff is all handled online.”

“Yeah?” Bucky knew for a fact that the FBI had been working with the Treasury to trace Stark’s money, and, failing to find any signs of dirty money or money laundering, had concluded he must be operating with cash only.

“Yeah. Boss didn’t want to tempt anyone or make them a target.” That was smart, Bucky reflected. Ripping off other gangs was an art form in organized crime. Still, he had to wonder how Stark kept the money transfers so well hidden from the best financial analysts in the US government.

“No targets except his accountant,” Bucky joked, fishing for info. “Like with Al Capone.”

KT just shrugged at that, like he didn’t know and didn’t care, so Bucky left it alone. “So what do we do with that stuff?” Bucky said, gesturing at the notebook KT had been writing in all morning.

“We take care of it.” He took the notebook out and flipped through it. “Not too much stuff this time.”

Bucky turned that over in his head. “So under the Mechanic, fixers actually…fix things,” he said. “You’re really going to call a shipping company and an insurance office and everything?”

“Yep. Well, _we_ are.”

Made sense; if businesses were paying Stark for protection, he could also throw in other services to sweeten the pot and keep people from rolling on him. Bucky shoved his hands in his pockets and was lost in thought while he mostly followed KT around the neighborhood. Granted he’d only been here for less than a week, but so far nothing was adding up to what he’d read in the case files on Stark and his organization. It was making him uneasy. He’d come here with a picture in his head, and a goal of filling in the holes so they could make a case against an organized crime boss; but now he was increasingly realizing that something was wrong with the picture. So when KT told him one night that they had the next two days off, Bucky sent another message on the Discord channel and when he got a confirmation, he went to the New York Library, the big one with the stone lions and millions of tourists. He went to the adult services desk and asked for a laptop. The librarian studied his ID, went to a safe, and handed him a laptop from inside. Bucky found a study carrell in a quiet spot and logged on with an 8 character name and 16 character password, established and memorized before he’d started this operation, and opened up the case files on Stark.

Scrolling through, Bucky felt some of his disquiet ease as he re-read the laundry list of crimes Stark was reportedly involved in: racketeering, tax fraud, illegal gambling, high-end car theft. Armed obberies; he opened up the file on robberies and realized with morbid amusement that even while Stark protected his own people from being targeted, he had no problem targeting bagmen from other gangs, making off with hundreds of thousands of dollars at a time. Tax fraud, obviously; if Tony was hiding all of his income from the FBI, he was definitely hiding it from the IRS. Though as he opened up Stark’s tax statements, gotten from a subpoena to the IRS, and noticed that the document for just one year was hundreds of pages long, Bucky reflected that a good accountant could hide a lot of money in his legitimate businesses and all the assets that Stark had inherited from his parents.

At the back of the file was sex trafficking, which was based on a handful of reports that said that prostitutes were disappearing from other parts of the city and showing up working for Stark. Bucky put a note next to that one recommending the line of investigation be dropped. After spending hours and hours at the brothel chatting to the Widow and the ladies there, waiting to see if Rumlow returned, he knew none of the men or women there were being forced to stay, not even for lack of other work. Widow recruited from all around the city, helping people get out of the business if they wanted to and offering others a chance to work for her. Turns out, most of that building was devoted to the people who worked in the brothel: everyone got their own apartment, which was separate from the suites they entertained clients, and there was an in-house doctor and even childcare in the basement. All the money went straight back to the sex workers, except for this mysterious buy-in that no one had explained yet, and they were using it for a bewildering array of side projects that the women were more than happy to talk about during their down time.

After a few hours, which included writing up his reports from the past few weeks of working for Stark, Bucky sat back and closed the laptop. It was his first month, he reminded himself. No one was going to let him close to the real work of the organization after just a few weeks. He sent another message to his handler on Discord, and when he got a confirmation back, he stood up and walked away from the carrell; when he was about twenty feet away, he saw his police contact, dressed like a soccer mom, come by and spirit the laptop away.

His next stop was the gym; by the time he was done, shirt soaked wet with sweat and muscles aching, his head felt clearer. He didn’t know why Stark was trying so hard to seem like a good guy, but if Bucky was patient enough he’d scrape past all the pseudo-philanthropy and get to the real man underneath. Stark wasn’t the first guy to be handsome and charming and charismatic while hiding a dark side.


	4. 404: File Not Found

Over the next few weeks Bucky did start to get hints of Stark’s criminal operations, at least the ones that were easy to see: the illegal gambling dens, knockoff designer bags and sunglasses, the chop shops that picked up and moved every two weeks. This was the stuff that they already knew about, though, and so far Bucky hadn’t been able to directly link Stark to any of it. Learning that Stark had an accountant was the biggest break he’d had so far, but despite his best efforts he hadn’t gotten even the hint of a name. He was so lost in thought trying to figure out a way to get deeper into Stark’s organization that he didn’t even notice that KT had stopped walking until he was already several steps away.

“What’s up?” he asked and followed KT’s gaze to the park bench where someone was sleeping, an overflowing shopping cart pulled up next to them.

“Stay here,” KT said, and went over to the bench. As Bucky watched, he squatted next to the bench. He must have said something because the person startled awake and sat up, scooting away from him. Now that the person was sitting up, Bucky could see that it was an older woman, gray hair waving in the wind. KT remained crouched, hands up, still talking. He was there long enough that Bucky looked around for a place to sit, but before he could find a seat KT handed her something and walked away. KT had his phone out and was talking on it by the time he got back to where Bucky was waiting, so Bucky walked in silence until KT hung up.

“Who was that?” he asked as KT put his phone away, looking over his shoulder at where the old woman was pushing her cart somewhere else.

“Social worker,” KT answered. “Boss keeps one on retainer.”

“Retainer?”

“Yeah. She works for the city, but the Boss pays her extra to handle the cases he sends her way. Anna there,” he said, gesturing towards the old woman, “refused to go to the shelter so I told Ms. Walker to have someone come talk to her, see if they can get her some help.” Bucky managed to not roll his eyes, though he wanted to, but he must have made some kind of noise because KT looked up at him and said, “What?”

“Nothing,” Bucky said, but KT put a hand on his arm and pulled him to a stop right there on the sidewalk.

“No, we’re going to talk about this. You’ve had an attitude whenever I talk about the Boss since you started, and I’m tired of it. Say what you want to say.”

“I just don’t get why you really believe all that stuff, about Tony Stark being in it for a little guy. ‘The mob boss with a heart of gold,’” Bucky said sarcastically. “I mean, a social worker? Really? Head start programs, scholarships, small business loans, the whole line about kicking out drug dealers - it’s all bullshit. He’s just got a hell of a PR team.”

“And there it is. I knew this was coming. You new guys are all the same.” KT gave him a scornful look. “Look, belief is for things that you don’t know are true, so no, I don’t _believe_ all that stuff. I _know_ it.” He took his jacket off and pulled up the sleeve on his left arm; the inside of his forearm and elbow were scarred with track marks. “My name wasn’t Kenton when I was born, it was Katie,” he said. “My parents let me stay until I was eighteen, then they kicked me out on my birthday. I spent a year on the streets, and I was one of the first people in that rehab center when it reopened. The sweet deal I mentioned that you get at the 90 day mark? It's a rent-controlled apartment and a job. With benefits, no less. Haven’t been back on the bullshit since, and now the Boss is paying for me to get a degree in social work.”

Bucky was stunned. “That’s insane,” he said as KT put his jacket back on. “I don’t…people aren’t like that in real life.”

“Yeah, that’s what they say,” KT said with a snort, and turned to keep walking. “But I think that assholes want you to think that _everyone_ is an asshole deep down; that way you don’t get mad at them for being assholes. Because if people knew that there were good guys, like _really_ good guys like the Boss, then no one would put up with the assholes anymore. You get me?”

“Yeah,” Bucky said faintly. “It’s just…”

“I know. I had a hard time believing it, too. Kept waiting for the other shoe to fall, you know? Like, no one gives away this stuff for free. But then the Boss sat down with a bunch of us and explained the buy-in, and that’s what made me realize he was for real.”

“Is anyone ever going to explain what that means? The buy-in?”

“When you’re ready, the Boss will explain what it means.” As they walked, KT pointed out small things around the neighborhood that Bucky had noticed but not really paid much attention to: the walls covered with paint that Bucky had assumed was graffiti but was actually street art, commissioned from local high schoolers; sidewalks were power washed with no weeds in the cracks; the space between the sidewalk and the curb often had flowers rather than being a sad patch of dead dirt and litter. No broken windows, no broken street lights, playgrounds with new equipment. It wasn’t like it was suddenly a rich neighborhood, with boutique shops and craft breweries, but it was clean and safe and clearly cared for. Bucky went through the rest of the shift on autopilot, lost in thought.

That night, he couldn’t sleep for thinking about it, so finally he pulled out his computer. He hadn’t done demographic research like this since he’d studied sociology in college, but gradually the picture started to emerge. Census data, crime rates, education statistics, property values, employment rates – they all added up to a picture that was hard to argue with: there was a bubble of prosperity around the neighborhoods that Stark controlled, an effect that faded quickly beyond the de facto edge of his territory.

Bucky closed his laptop slowly and bit his lip. Some of the stuff he’d seen, like helping out the local businesses and the sex workers, could be explained as being good business sense. But for the life of him he couldn’t figure out why a mob boss would care about high school graduation rates and early childhood education. He exhaled and pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes.

“A criminal philanthropist is still a criminal,” he said to his ceiling. “Right?”

* * *

As the weather grew cooler, Bucky realized had been working for Stark long enough to have developed something of a routine; he worked with KT during the week, but occasionally swapped out for one of Stark’s other _patsani_ when KT was needed for something else, then on his days off he made his way to the library to make his report to his handlers. Despite what Stark had said about him being a cop when they first met, Stark seemed willing to let him stay on the streets; Bucky figured maybe it had been a test or his idea of a joke. But the sheer normalcy of the routine meant that, despite his best efforts, he had started to relax and let down his guard. He realized just how relaxed he had gotten when he showed up to meet KT for their daily rounds and Happy was there instead, leaning against one of Stark’s cars; his mind raced over the past few days as he felt a pulse of panic that he had screwed up somehow and his cover was blown. “What’s up, Happy?” Bucky said, steps slowing as his blood ran cold.

“New gig tonight,” he said, holding a car door open for Bucky. “You’re going to be the Boss’s bodyguard.” Bucky let out a silent breath and his shoulders relaxed as the spike of fear was replaced by a quick thrill of excitement. This was the opportunity he'd been looking for.

He shrugged carelessly as he got in the car. “Anything I should know?”

“Boss will tell you what you need to know.”

Happy took him back to the garage where he’d met Stark the first time, only this time instead of the grungy mechanic, Stark looked like _the_ Tony Stark, the capital _M_ Mechanic that Bucky had expected to see then. He was wearing a tailored Tom Ford three piece suit, charcoal grey over a crimson collared shirt, and his jaw was clean shaven except for his trademark Van Dyke beard. He was talking to a Black man with a military bearing, but when he saw them come in he gave them a blinding smile that made Bucky’s heart skip a beat. While Bucky tried to process that unexpected development Tony pushed his glasses to the top of his head and studied Bucky with eyes that were sparkling with humor, like he'd just heard a joke he was eager to share.

“Hey, copper,” he said as Bucky approached. “New job for you. I’ve got a black tie event to go to and I need someone to watch my back, so you’re going to be my plus one.”

"Not a cop," Bucky said automatically, then he heard the rest of Stark's sentence. “Wait, plus one? I’m your _date?_ ” he said before he could stop himself.

That surprised a laugh out of Stark. The curl of his smile got sultry and intimate, and he stepped closer to Bucky, who could only stare and swallow thickly, frozen in place. “Do you want to be, Blue Eyes?” he murmured, and Bucky got goosebumps as his voice got deep and smooth. The humor in Stark's eyes turned into flicker of interest as the moment stretched like hot taffy and a denial failed to manifest. Bucky bit his lip as Stark swayed closer, and his breath stalled in his lungs Stark’s gaze flicked down to his mouth and then back up. This close, he could tell that Stark was a few inches shorter than him; if he tilted his head down and Stark tilted his head up, they could be-

“Tony,” Stark’s friend said quellingly, breaking the tension. “Stop teasing the poor man.”

Stark inhaled sharply, as if he’d forgotten they weren’t alone, and took a step back. The glasses came back down over his eyes, and by the time he turned to face his friend, the laughing smile was back in place. “You should have seen his face, Rhodey,” he said, hands in his pockets as he strolled away. “I’ve never seen a person’s brain blue screen so thoroughly before. No, Blue Eyes, you’re not my date, you’re my bodyguard.”

Bucky blew out a breath, feeling shaky for some reason, and rewound the conversation. “Black tie event, you said?” Bucky looked down at his outfit, jeans and a Henley shirt, with his old military issue boots and a jean jacket.

Tony tilted his head towards the back of the garage, not meeting his eyes. “I got your fancy duds in the bathroom back there. And a razor, though I dig the manly stubble.”

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Rhodey said as Blue Eyes closed the door to the bathroom to get changed.

“Of course,” Tony said, keeping his voice light despite the fact that his nerves were still vibrating like a plucked string. “First of all, it’s objectively hilarious and you know it. Second, photos from this event are going to be all over the internet and I don’t want you or Happy to get that kind of press.” He looked over to see that Rhodey was watching him skeptically. “What?”

“Don’t sleep with the undercover cop.”

“I won’t.”

“Uh huh.” Somehow Rhodey’s skeptical face got more skeptical. “I saw that moment. You guys had a moment.”

“I’m not going to sleep with the undercover cop,” Tony repeated dutifully, wishing Rhodey would drop it. Because there _had_ been a moment, a breathtakingly arousing moment that had felt as fragile as spun glass and as powerful as a hurricane; at any other time with any other person Tony would have chased that moment, that feeling, but the reminder that Blue Eyes was a cop had soured it. Now Tony wished he had a drink to wash the taste of want from his mouth. “Is Happy bringing the car around?” he asked, trying to change the subject.

The pause before Rhodey answered made it clear that he knew what Tony was doing, but instead of calling him out on it he just said, “It’s already out front.”

After a few more minutes, Tony heard the doorknob to the bathroom turning and consciously plastered an easygoing look on his face as Blue Eyes came out. It was good that Tony had a legendary poker face, because seeing Blue Eyes in a fitted suit, clean-shaven with his slightly long hair brushed back from his face, would have broken a lesser bisexual. Shaving made him look ten years younger and drew attention to his full mouth, which was currently frowning in concentration as he tried to fasten his cufflinks one-handed. A rare sense of self-preservation kept Tony from offering to help; he stuffed his hands in his pockets against the urge to reach out and run his fingers along the sharp, smooth line of Blue Eyes’ jaw.

Rhodey must have seen something in Tony’s face or posture that gave away his thoughts, because he said, “ _Don’t sleep with_ -“

“Enough, Rhodey,” Tony said under his breath. “Ready, Blue Eyes?” he said more loudly, gesturing towards the door where Happy was waiting. Blue Eyes nodded and followed him, climbing into the front seat next to Happy while Tony sat in the back.

“So where are we going?” Blue Eyes asked, turning around in the seat to look at Tony.

The reminder immediately cheered Tony up. “The Policeman’s Ball,” he said with relish, and got to see Blue Eyes’ brain 404 error for the second time that night.


	5. Keeping Up Appearances

Bucky stared sightlessly at New York traffic as he quietly panicked. He tried and failed to think of any way to get out of this, now that he was already in the car; if he could have, he would have given himself nausea and diarrhea immediately and suffered the indignity instead of escorting Tony Stark, the Mechanic, the single most powerful crime boss in Manhattan, to the Policeman’s Ball. What in the hell was he going to say to his handler? For three blocks he debated whether to give them any advance warning at all; it would be so much easier to deal with the fallout later by claiming that Stark had taken his phone before telling him where he was going. For three more blocks, he tried and failed to type something, each sentence he came up with sounding dumber than the last, so with only the barest bit of guilt he stashed his phone in the car’s glove compartment as Happy pulled into the drop off line for the ball.

Cameras started flashing almost as soon as he got out of the car to open Stark’s door, and while Stark climbed out, smiling and waving, he tried to look as boring as possible, mouth a flat line as he ignored the press and kept an eye out for anyone looking suspicious. Just what exactly was he supposed to be guarding Stark from, anyway? Other mob bosses in attendance? A mugger? The _police?_

“Want a drink?” Stark said once they got inside, and Bucky forced himself to shake his head even though he desperately wanted to say yes. He trailed behind Stark as he glad-handed the crowd, making jokes and asking after people’s kids, and miserably tallied the various important people in the room: the mayor, who gave Stark a handshake and a clap on the back for his donation to the Food Bank For NYC; a representative to the state house, who managed to solicit campaign donations in the guise of complimenting him on his philanthropic efforts; a US Senator that thanked him for his investment advice. And those were just the people that Bucky recognized; there was no telling how many government officials and CEOs that numbered among the people that subtly held court around Stark. He wondered how many knew about Stark’s criminal ties, and how many would care if they did know.

Finally, for Bucky’s sanity, they made the announcement for dinner and everyone filed dutifully into the main hall where they set up tables for the event.

“I was wondering if you were coming, Tony,” an amused voice said from behind them. Stark turned, and the smile he had been wearing all night widened and finally reached his eyes as a tall, slim redhead let him pull her down to kiss her on the cheek.

“Pepper, so glad to see you,” he said, taking one of her hands and putting it in his elbow. “Are you sitting next to me?”

“Of course.” Bucky recognized the woman from Stark’s case file; she was Virginia Potts, his personal lawyer. Though ‘lawyer’ didn’t really capture her, really; from a police perspective, she was Cerberus, the dragon guarding the tower, Gandalf on the bridge: in short, “You Shall Not Pass” in human form. She was largely the reason why Bucky was on this undercover assignment; faced with the potential of meeting her in court, no judge or DA in the city would grant them a warrant without a literal smoking gun of Stark’s guilt. She was just as well connected as Stark was, to boot; one of the other senior partners at her firm was on the short list of the Democrats’ Supreme Court Justice picks and the other worked for the state as the deputy Attorney General. “How are you? Who’s this?” she asked, finally noticing Bucky following them to the dinner table.

“I’m fine, and this is a new guy,” Stark said as he pulled the seat out for Potts to sit. “I call him Blue Eyes.”

Potts rolled her eyes and offered Bucky a surprisingly kind smile. “Don’t worry, he can’t remember my real name either,” she said. “Don’t take it personally.”

“I don’t, ma’am,” Bucky said, returning her smile despite himself.

“Oh, Bill, it’s good to see you,” Stark said, and Bucky glanced away from Potts to see that sitting right across from Stark was the NY police commissioner.

Tony hid a smile as he heard the strangled noise Blue Eyes made when he recognized the police commissioner. But after an evening of watching the man sweat as Tony rubbed elbows with the most powerful men in the state, he took pity on him. “I’ll be good for a while, if you need to take a break,” he said, and watched with amusement as the man all but fled from the table.

“What was that about?” Pepper asked with a small frown, thanking the wait staff as they filled up her glass with water and set a glass of white wine in front of her.

“I think his eyes aren’t the only thing about that guy that’s blue,” Tony said, looking significantly towards the police commissioner. Pepper’s eyebrows shot up and she took a drink of wine as she realized what he was saying, then she barely swallowed it in time before she laughed.

“And you brought him _here?_ You are a terrible person,” she scolded him, clearly trying to suppress a smile.

“Yeah. It’s been fun watching him trying to avoid the cameramen all night. Especially because he’s been so worried about being photographed that he probably didn’t notice the fact that half of the conversations I’ve had tonight involved breaking the law in some way or another.” For example, what had probably sounded like a request for a campaign contribution was actually a solicitation for a bribe, which Tony was going to pay because politicians were just good investments, really, and honestly the Senator Walker should really talk less about how much money he made off of insider trading, particularly when he is using his committee positions to do it.

This time, Pepper’s eyes held a flash of warning instead of amusement, and Tony held up his hands in surrender, turning the conversation to safer waters as they ate.

* * *

To Bucky’s surprise, Stark was ready to go not long after dinner; for some reason Bucky had the idea that he would want to stay all night, shaking hands and taking turns around the dance floor. He was all smiles as he left, but as soon as the car door closed behind him, he collapsed against the car seat with a sigh.

“You know,” Stark said, eyes closed as he rested his head on the back of the seat, “the funny thing about going to these events is that I probably shook hands with more criminals tonight than I have in the past six months put together. But no one cares about that because the people who are supposed to care are criminals too.”

“That sucks, Boss,” Happy said, clearly having heard this complaint before. Now that they were far from the crowds and bright lights, Stark’s good mood seemed to be curdling; he sounded almost depressed. 

“It’s exhausting, is what it is. Blue Eyes, have you ever had to shake hands with and smile at someone that you hated all the way down to your bones?” Stark’s voice was muffled and Bucky looked back to see that his hands were over his face as he rubbed his eyes.

“Yeah, of course. There’s always that one guy at every job, right? The asshole that no one likes?”

Stark barked out a laugh. “Having only one would be nice, actually.” He sat up suddenly and scooted forward until he was all but in the front seat. “Let’s get dessert. Is there a late night ice cream place? Or pie? Or donuts? Back there they only had some sort of fancy baklava on the menu and I don't like honey.”

Happy and Bucky shared a look and Bucky patted his pockets for his phone before remembering that he’d put it in the glove compartment. Then he remembered _why_ he’d left it in the car, and winced as he saw the notifications on his phone. But it was after midnight so that was going to be a Future Bucky problem. He pulled up the search bar and found a late night cookie company that was on their way home.

When they got there, there was no place to park, so Bucky got out with Stark to go inside while Happy stayed with the car. Unsurprisingly, they were the oldest people inside; the cashier and the two other customers looked like they were still in high school or college, because realistically who would be looking for a sugar fix this late at night except students. And one mob boss with a sweet tooth, apparently. Stark made a beeline for the display case and all but pressed his nose to the glass.

“What’s your favorite kind of cookie?”

“Something with fruit and nuts in it,” Bucky said. “You?” Bucky came up next to him to read all the labels. “Mexican chili cookie? Who wants a spicy cookie?”

“Can’t do better than chocolate chip,” Stark said. “But that salted caramel is speaking to me.” He glanced up at the menu and said, “Ooh, ice cream sandwiches,” sounding so excited that Bucky had to smother a smile. It was hard to keep a straight face as Stark deliberated; the man was being so stupidly cute as he debated the merits of the different options that Bucky had the dumbest fucking desire to kiss him. Stark ended up buying a whole box of cookies and an ice cream sandwich because he couldn’t decide on which cookies he wanted, and because he kept thinking of people to give them to: “Happy will say he’s on a diet but I think he’ll want one of these M&M cookies. I don’t think I’ve ever seen mint in a cookie, I’ll get that one for Rhodey, but also this sprinkle one because it will be funny.”

Maybe it was the sugar or the impulsive shopping trip, but Stark seemed in lighter spirits as they drove the rest of the way back to his garage, telling funny stories about the people that had been at the event. It even made Happy unbend a little, as much as he ever did when he was working, and at one point Bucky was laughing so hard he was in tears.

“Here’s good, Happy,” Stark said before they could pull into the secured parking lot behind the garage.

“Are you sure, Boss?” Happy said dubiously. “It’s not safe-”

“I got Blue Eyes to protect my virtue, right Blue Eyes?” Stark said. Bucky almost bobbled the box of cookies as climbed out of the car at the mention of Stark’s virtue, and when Stark met his eyes Bucky knew he’d done it on purpose. “Come on inside with me,” Stark continued. “We need to talk about the event tonight.” He leaned over to look at Happy through the window. “You go on home, I’ll make sure he gets home ok.” When Happy nodded, Stark tapped on the top of the car and stepped back from the curb as the car pulled away

Bucky’s hands tightened on the box of cookies as his heart gave a heavy thump and his mouth went dry. He swallowed against a spike of nerves. _We need to talk_ was never a good sign, but also, he was about to be alone with Stark. Trying not to think about what had happened earlier, he trailed awkwardly behind Stark as he put in the security code for the door and stepped inside, turning on a few of the big banks of fluorescent lights as he went.

“You can change, if you want,” Stark said, gesturing towards the bathroom where Bucky’s clothes were still folded neatly on the sink. He shrugged out of his suit coat and unbuttoned the sleeves, rolling them up so the cuffs didn’t dangle. Bucky’s eyes lingered for a moment on the lean muscles of his forearm, the strong, slender wrist bracketed by the narrow-banded watch, and decided that a moment alone in the bathroom was a good idea.

He changed quickly and splashed cold water on his face, giving himself a stern lecture about professionalism in the mirror, reminding himself why he was really here. His boss would be telling him that this was a great opportunity, that he seemed to have Stark’s trust. That now would be the perfect time to dig a little deeper. Bucky told himself that even though Stark was handsome and funny and apparently the kind of guy that would stuff a hundred dollar bill in a tip jar didn’t mean that…

“Wait, start over,” he muttered, shaking his head. Even though Stark seemed like a good person he was, at the very least, the target of a massive criminal investigation, even if it did seem like maybe there were worse criminals out there they could be investigating. They weren’t friends, he reminded himself. Stark didn’t know anything about him, and would probably drop him into the Hudson if he did. With that sobering thought, Bucky sighed, gathered up the fancy suit and shoes Stark had lent him, and went back out to the main room.

Then that whole pep talk promptly went out the window as he came out to see Stark sitting on a metal table, swinging his legs like a kid as he ate a cookie. As Bucky came closer, he saw that Stark had kicked off his shoes and had also taken a signle bite out of half the cookies in the box. When he looked up at Bucky with a smile of welcome, Bucky knew that he was in trouble.

“So what did we need to talk about?” he asked, taking a seat on the table next to Sta- Tony. He might as well stop calling him Stark; it’s not as if thinking of him by his last name was helping him maintain any sort of objectivity.

“Just getting your impression about tonight. Did you notice anything I should know about?” Tony held out the cookie box and Bucky took one of the oatmeal craisin ones, one of the few that Tony hadn't taste tested.

He took a bite to buy himself some time to think; Bucky had a lot of observations from tonight, ranging from the completely inappropriate (the curve of Tony's ass when Ms. Potts dropped something and Tony bent over to pick it up) to the irrelevant (not impressed with the music selection) to the potentially explosive (the Commandant had a drinking problem and was probably cheating on his wife). Assessing which were relevant to Tony took a moment. “There were a couple of people that were giving you the evil eye all night,” he said finally. “Right after you shook hands with them they looked like they wanted to shank you.”

Tony threw his head back and laughed at that. “I’m sure. Was one of them a skinny tool with glasses? Justin Hammer?”

“Yeah, that was one. Another one was the Special Agent in Charge of an FBI satellite office-”

“Not surprising,” Tony commented. “She’s new. The new ones are always hungry, she’ll come around.”

“-And the other was a big guy, bald but had a beard. I didn’t catch his name, sounded like you called him Toby.”

“You mean Obie? Obediah Stane?” Tony said with surprise. He dug out his phone and pulled up a picture. “This guy?”

Bucky leaned over to look at the phone. “Yeah. I always saw him watching you when you were talking to other people. Guy had eyes like a shark. People like him can kill someone and pass a lie detector test while his hands were still bloody. Who is he?”

“A family friend.” Tony frowned down at his phone and tapped it against his palm thoughtfully. “At least, I thought he was.”

“Oh shit. I’m sorry,” Bucky said. “Maybe I’m wrong, you know, I’m not-” _an expert_ , is what he was going to say, but he stopped because no matter how you sliced it, cop or criminal, he was. He was an expert in assessing threats, and that guy was definitely bad news.

Tony waved his words away and tossed his phone on the table with a clatter. “It’s fine. Better to know. I’ll look into it. Anything else?”

Bucky shook his head and took another bite of cookie. “Why do you go to these things if they are full of people you don’t like and apparently people who don’t like you?”

“Networking, mostly. Obligation. Gotta show my face every now and then. Spite,” he added with a smirk. “But it’s also a good reminder.” When Bucky made a questioning sound, he took another cookie from the box and nibbled the edge. “Look, I was a rich asshole for a long time,” Tony said after a moment. “Too long. Then one day, I met a guy at a party. Don’t even know how he got invited because he wasn’t rich, wasn’t famous, he was just some doctor. And I don’t remember what I was saying, but at one point he looked at me with such _pity,_ ” Tony said, eyebrows drawing together. He studied his cookie like it was helping him remember. “I still remember his face. No one had looked at me with pity before, and he said, ‘Look at you. All this money and still you have nothing.’ And I was like, ‘excuse me? Do you know who I am?’ As you do, right, because I could have anything I wanted, I’m fucking Tony Stark. And he said, ‘Yeah, I know who you are. I’ve seen dozens of men like you. And despite all their money, all their fame, death came for all of them in the end, and they had nothing to show for it but a tacky tombstone.’” Tony bit his lip, frowning a little. “I’m sure I said something, but he just finished his drink and walked away, like I wasn’t worth his time. I wish I could say that I had this like, huge change of heart and changed my ways after that night, but it ended up being this gradual thing.”

Bucky realized he was staring. “What do you mean?” he asked, taking a bite out of the cookie he just remembered he was holding.

“Well, I looked him up later and found out he ran a free clinic downtown and on a whim I donated some money. Like, 'see what a good person I am, have some money.' Like I was proving him wrong somehow by doing that." Tony snorted and shook his head at the memory. "Anyway, doing that puts you on some kind of list somewhere, apparently, and one day I got an email about a runaway shelter. Then a food bank, then a refugee thing, and it kind of snowballed from there.”

“Wait, wait.” Bucky shook his head. “How did you go from ‘donating to a clinic’ to ‘mob boss over half of Manhattan’? That’s one hell of a snowball.”

“Well, after donating to a bunch of causes, I saw that a housing complex near all these nonprofits went up for sale, so I bought it,” he said with a shrug, fiddling with a napkin as he talked. He was already done with his cookie somehow, despite having done most of the talking. He reached for another from the box and took a tiny bite. “I was kinda feeling like, I don’t know, tied to this area as I kept an eye on my pet projects. Then I started getting a bunch of complaints about the conditions and I was pretty fucking appalled at what I was seeing. Like, no one should live like that. It was a shame for _rats_ to even be living there. So I fixed it up, and then I set up a trust for the building and gave it back to the tenants. All their rent goes in a fund, and they spend money on that fund to pay for what the complex needed.”

“Like a condo association?”

“More like a cooperative. They decide how much to charge everyone for rent, they decide if they want to spend money on painting the place or upgrading the light fixtures, you know, whatever. I think last time I checked they had put in a community garden. So when another came up for sale, I bought it, and then another, then I realized I might as well invest in some of the businesses here. After the fiasco of that first apartment building, I started looking at what I was spending my money on so I would know what to expect. Then when I was looking at a commercial building, people came in to shake down the owner of one of the businesses _while I was there._ Like, I was standing right there and those people didn’t give a shit who saw them. I was so surprised that I didn’t say anything until it was over, and then I asked the guy if that happened a lot. Can’t let that go on, you know, because...well, I mean, the owner looked so scared, and that made me mad because he's just trying to make a living, you know? Also, it cuts into the bottom line, so.” Tony shrugged again. “I put a stop to it. And then, well,” he gestured expressively around him with his cookie. “Like I said. Snowball.”

Bucky could only stare, bemused. If he had heard the same story on his first day of work, he might have been unable to keep from laughing in Stark’s face. But now…well, it was increasingly hard to square what the police knew – or thought they knew – about Tony Stark and what Bucky was seeing. “I guess no kid wants to be a criminal when they grow up,” Bucky said. “We all just kind of wander into it.”

“Yeah? Is that how you went from Bagram to Brighton Beach?”

Now it was Bucky’s turn to shrug, uncomfortable. After hearing Tony's story, he didn’t want to feed him some bullshit line from his cover story. “There’s only a few career opportunities for a grunt back home,” he said vaguely. “Even fewer that pay well.”

He glanced up to see Tony studying him thoughtfully. “Do you miss it?”

“The Army? Hell no.” That part was true enough.

“How about here? Are you happy here?”

Bucky’s mouth quirked. “Are you asking me about my job satisfaction? One means not at all satisfied, ten means highly satisfied?” He had the pleasure of watching Tony almost spit out a bite of cookie as he surprised a laugh out of him.

“Sure,” Tony said after a moment when he finished chewing. "One out of ten."

“Ten,” Bucky said truthfully. “I like helping people.” He had the traitorous thought that the past few months working with KT had been closer to what he'd _thought_ it would be like to be a cop than what it had actually turned out to be like, and felt vaguely guilty.

“Yeah, me too.” 

They sat there in a surprisingly comfortable silence for a few moments before Bucky heard the ding of a notification on his phone. He silenced it without looking – his handlers were still yelling about the Policeman’s Ball – but sighed when he saw the time. “It’s getting late,” Bucky said reluctantly, more because it seemed appropriate rather than any desire to actually leave. He opened his mouth to say, _I had a great time tonight_ and immediately felt like an idiot because, bare feet and half-eaten box of cookies aside, this wasn't, in fact, a _date._

But apparently he wasn’t the only one who had lost the plot, because Tony said, “Would you like to come up for a dr-” before he cut himself off with a look of horror that would have been funny if Bucky hadn’t, deep down, wanted so badly to say yes. “I’ll call you a cab,” he said instead, looking away to grab his phone.

“I’ll wait outside,” Bucky said, and fled.

* * *

Tony watched from a window as Blue Eyes' taxi drove away, then as Tony went up the elevator to his penthouse condo he texted a sad face to Rhodey.

 _Told you it was a bad idea,_ Rhodey wrote back.

 _Don’t say I told you so. I’m sad_ , Tony wrote back _._

 _You’re making yourself sad pining after an undercover cop._ _I don’t feel bad for you._

“That’s fair,” Tony said out loud. _You should. I got you cookies and you’re being mean to me._ Tony texted Rhodey a picture of the half-empty box of cookies and made himself sad all over again, remembering the intensity with which Blue Eyes had stared at the display of cookies when told to pick one, like it was a pop quiz that he was determined to pass.

_Go to bed, Tones._

With a sigh, Tony tossed his phone on the bed and started peeling himself out of the monkey suit, setting the cufflinks he’d been wearing on his dresser as he threw the suit and shirt on the back of a chair to be dry cleaned. The problem was that tonight, like every night for the past few years, Tony was going to bed by himself. There had been a certain point where he’d realized that he’d tipped over from bending the rules, to breaking the rules, then to breaking the rules in a way that would get him put on lists written by people with badges, and at that point he’d realized that to bring anyone into his life was to put a target on them. The only way to avoid it was to not get close to anyone, but he’d done the one-and-done lifestyle and wasn’t interested in that anymore. It had been Pepper for a while, because she was more than capable of protecting herself, but after a year she had gently but firmly told him that it wasn’t working for her, and that had been the end of it. Since then, there had been a few people that he thought _maybe, maybe this one_ but in the end, they didn’t feel right.

Blue Eyes felt right. He knew it was dumb and he knew what Rhodey would say – _star crossed lovers only exist in fiction, Tones_ \- but as he slid between the sheets that night, he let himself daydream about it until he fell asleep.


	6. A New Hope

A week or so later, Bucky met KT up for their usual shift and was surprised to see that the normally taciturn man was visibly excited, rocking back and forth on his heels as he waited. “What’s up?” Bucky asked, curiosity driving him to jog across traffic to see what had KT so worked up.

“It’s Community Appreciation Day,” KT said, jerking his head towards Tony’s garage a few blocks away. His legs were shorter than Bucky’s but excitement was making him walk fast enough that Bucky had to make an effort to keep up.

“Community Appreciation Day?” Bucky repeated incredulously. "What is that?"

"What does it sound like, doofus?" KT said, but he was in too good of a mood for his words to have any heat.

Bucky shook his head. Of course Tony had community appreciation days. At this point he wouldn’t be surprised if Tony had an EEOC office and regular OSHA inspections and celebrated Office Professional's Day. "I'm just surprised I hadn't heard of it before now."

“Yeah, they're usually on real short notice. The Engineer brought in a shipment late last night so the Boss spread the word that we were having a party.”

Now Bucky was even more confused. He knew from the case file that the Engineer ran Tony’s chop shop operations, stealing high end automobiles and helping them disappear, whole or in pieces, on the black market. What that had to do with appreciating the community Bucky had no idea; it’s not like Tony was giving away the cars he stole…right? 

When they nodded to Tony’s guards and pushed open the door to the garage, Bucky’s jaw dropped. In the wide open space, where there was usually a variety of half-built classic cars, there was instead half a dozen sleek, low slung cars that looked like they were breaking the speed limit just sitting there. He recognized the logo for Ferrari and Lamborghini but the rest he’d never even heard of before. Most of them had their hoods up for car enthusiasts to drool over the high-performance engines and Bucky felt his heart start to beat faster as he left KT behind to look at the Lamborghini. He hadn’t really had his hands on a car engine since he joined the Army, other than doing his own routine maintenance, but looking at the ridiculously high-powered engine on this car was like seeing the face of God.

“Look at you, you sexy beast,” Bucky murmured, running a hand over the gleaming engine block. It was like it had barely been driven, it was so clean. “You’re sex on wheels, that’s what you are.”

“Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just really into cars?”

Bucky turned and his heart flipped when he saw Tony smiling at him, wearing a suit with an AC/DC shirt underneath. Tony pushed his glasses up onto his head and leaned his hip on the car’s bumper, hands in his pockets as he studied Bucky with what looked like fond amusement. “This thing is like the Mona Lisa of cars,” Bucky said, feeling strangely shy. This was the first time he’d seen Tony since the night of the ball and he suddenly, stupidly, wished he had shaved and worn his nice jeans.

“This one is nice,” Tony agreed, “but _that_ one is my favorite.” He gestured with his chin towards the bright red Ferrari across the room, scissor doors opened up and away from the car like fiery wings.

“I can see that, it’s definitely your style.”

“Follow me, one came in that I think is _your_ style,” Tony said, pushing off the car.

“Yeah?” Bucky was intrigued and flattered as Tony led him through the crowd of people. “Which one- Jesus fucking Christ on a cracker,” he blurted when they stopped in front the most goddamn beautiful car he’d ever seen.

“The Bugatti La Voiture Noire,” Tony said, but his eyes were on Bucky’s face, not the car. “0 to 60 in 2.5 seconds, with 1,180 pounds of torque. Top speed of 261 miles an hour.”

Bucky whistled, long and low. “It looks like the Batmobile,” he said, smiling when he surprised a laugh out of Tony. “If a ninja was a car, it would be this car.”

Tony started to say something, but at that moment came the sound of someone tapping on a microphone. “Hello?” Bucky heard someone say. “Mr. Stark, are you ready?”

With an apologetic glance to Bucky, Tony jogged up to where they had made a makeshift stage out of a metal table. Tony climbed on top and took the microphone. “Good afternoon, everyone,” he said, sliding his sunglasses over his eyes as his grin grew wide and polished. “Are you ready for everyone’s favorite day of the quarter?” The crowd, which had quieted and turned to face Tony, cheered. “I know, me too. As you can see, there are six cars, so there will be six MVPs named today. As your name is called, winners, come up to take a bow and tell us which car you will be taking for a test drive before they all move on to their new owners.”

“That’s the reward?” Bucky said with surprise to no one in particular. “You get to drive the cars? Where?”

“The Boss rents out a racetrack,” the guy next to him said. “You get to drive it for thirty minutes. Or you can just take the cash prize, if you aren’t interested in the cars or don’t know how to drive.”

“Let’s take a minute to get to know our guests,” Tony was saying. “The sexy red beauty is a Ferrari LaFerrari, a lame name for a nice car. This particular one used to be owned by Mark Zuckerburg, purchased for $1.4 million with the proceeds of selling Facebook user data to over 150 companies. Proceeds from its resale is going to the Free Internet Project.” There was enthusiastic applause, then he gestured towards the Bugatti. “This fucking amazing car is a Bugatti La Voiture Noire, the most expensive car on the planet at $18 million. Jeff Bezos commissioned this car even as workers in Amazon warehouses were passing out from exhaustion while working for minimum wage. Proceeds from the sale of this pinnacle of human engineering will go to help Amazon workers unionize for better working conditions.” Each car in the warehouse had a similar story, and Bucky couldn’t help booing and cheering with the crowd as he heard each story.

“But enough of those assholes,” Tony said, waving for the crowd to get quiet. “Let’s hear about our heroes. First is Harley Keener, who has worked tirelessly to set up our own free neighborhood broadband using satellite dishes he made himself; it’s making ISPs in the city big mad, as the kids say, but we’ve got higher and more consistent speeds than they provide so they can suck it, right? It’s not like they were laying fiber here anyway.” As he spoke, a teenager came up and Tony gave him a hand to help him climb onto the table. There was applause, and the kid picked the Lamborghini, and hopped down off the table with a check and a certificate from the Maria Stark Foundation. The rest of the projects were in the same vein: a woman who set up a program to encourage stores and restaurants to donate excess food to soup kitchens and shelters to reduce food waste ("I know it's against the law, but it's a stupid law so we've elected to ignore it"); an older Black man who got the city to put in new solar-powered bus stops at safer and more convenient locations; and a principal who had a 100% graduation rate for the first time in the school’s history, among others. “And every senior was registered to vote as they got their diploma,” Tony added. “Great work, everyone! Winners, I’ll see you soon for your test drives, and for everyone else make sure you eat all this food, boxes are at the end of the table for you to take some home.” There was another round of applause, the biggest one yet, as Tony handed the microphone to Happy and climbed off the table.

“You’re just a regular Robin Hood, aren’t you?” Bucky said when Tony found him again, this time holding a plate full of chicken wings, donuts, and assorted fruit. “Stealing from the rich to give to the poor?”

“I like to think of myself as an instrument of poetic justice,” Tony said around a mouthful of food. “I used to steal them and wreck them, but I realized this was more fitting.”

Bucky knew he shouldn’t be quite so amused about six counts of grand – _very_ grand – theft auto, but it was hard not to smile at the smug look on Tony’s face while he had powdered sugar in his goatee. As someone pulled Tony away with a question, Bucky felt his phone buzz with a notification. He moved closer to the wall as he pulled it out to check his messages.

 _Gonna be a party tonight_ , his Discord contact had written, along with an address. A very familiar address, since he was standing right at it. _You gonna be there?_

Bucky stared at the message and sagged against the wall as his stomach sank. Glancing up at the cars, he realized that the police must have gotten a tipoff that the cars were incoming and were planning to raid the garage tonight, before they disappeared again. The message wasn’t an invitation, it was a warning for him to stay away so his cover wouldn’t get blown. “Shit,” he said, and wiped a hand over his face as he thought furiously. 

“What’s up?” Tony asked, licking wing sauce off his fingers. “You look like you got bad news.”

Bucky stared at him for a moment and realized that there was no way he was going to let Tony get arrested, no way he was going to let him go to jail or prison, let his name get dragged through the mud and see everything he'd built get torn apart by rival gangs. “Want to go on a date?” he blurted.

Tony’s face went slack with shock. “A date?” He blinked at Bucky for a long time, corners of his mouth quirking, before his face fell. “I can’t. You’re an employee,” he said regretfully.

“Seriously?” This guy, for crying out loud. “Ok, uh…” Bucky thought fast. “What about an employee counseling session? With food? We can talk about my, um, five year career plan.”

“Five year plan.” Tony stared at him with amused disbelief. “Ok, sure. Let’s do some employee counseling. When?”

“Tonight.”

“Tonight?” Tony repeated, clearly fishing for an explanation but Bucky couldn’t think of a good one so he just shrugged. “Alright,” he said slowly. “Far be it from me to discourage people from having life goals. Let’s say 8:00?”

“Sounds great,” Bucky said, trying and probably failing to keep the relief out of his voice.

“Ok, I’ll pick you up.”

“Perfect. I’ll see you then.” Bucky stood around awkwardly for a moment, then nodded stiffly and walked away. If he was going to have an identity crisis and second guess every decision he’d made in life that had led to him asking an organized crime boss out on a date, he should probably do it in privacy and hopefully get it done with by 8.

* * *

Baffled, Tony watched Blue Eyes hurry away, running the conversation over in his head until suddenly realization dawned. Then he found himself smiling so widely his cheeks hurt; joy was like champagne bubbles in his chest, making him want to laugh for no particular reason. He tossed his half-empty plate of food into the closest trashcan and threaded through the crowd until he found Rhodey leaning against the door, typing something one handed into his work tablet.

“Rhodey,” Tony said, beaming.

“Tony,” Rhodey said, looking up warily.

“Blue Eyes wants to have dinner with me. And it has to be tonight.”

Rhodey frowned. “But tonight is-”

“Exactly.”

Rhodey took one look at the beatific look on Tony’s face and started shaking his head. “Tony, no,” he said in warning.

“Tony, yes. He’s trying to protect me, Rhodey.” Tony felt downright giddy.

“You don’t know that.”

“I do! He knows the police are going to raid the garage tonight and he doesn’t want me here when it happens so I don’t get arrested for possession of stolen property. It’s so goddamn romantic I can’t stand it.” Brooks, or whatever the hell his real name was, couldn’t know that Tony had contacts inside every major law enforcement organization operating in the city and had known about the raid almost as soon as they had applied for a warrant. The stolen cars were already being prepared to be moved to a separate location, and in their place were going to be the exact same models all purchased legally and in Tony’s name. Pepper and her army of lawyers had already prepared righteously indignant press releases and harassment lawsuits and were just waiting for the cops to show up. Tony had even picked his outfit for his brief stint in jail, but apparently now he had other plans for the evening. “You know what this means, right?”

“I know what _you_ think it means, Tony, and I still think you should be careful. He is still a cop.”

Tony planted a loud, smacking kiss on Rhodey’s cheek. “You can’t take this from me, sour puss. I might get to keep Blue Eyes after all!”


	7. Just One Night

Bucky waited nervously for Tony to show up, forcing himself not to pace but unable to stop tapping his fingers against his knee as he sat on the couch and ignored the show he’d put on the television. In the past few hours he’d come to terms with the difficult realization that he was going to have to go to his handlers and recuse himself from this assignment. Having already made the decision to protect Tony from the raid, he couldn’t trust himself to not tamper with the investigation further, which would violate everything he believed in. Removing himself would set the investigation back for months, maybe even longer – which he couldn’t bring himself to feel bad about – but he couldn’t go through the motions for a mission he didn’t believe in. That was the whole reason he’d gotten out of the Army all those years ago. He knew he’d probably get busted down to traffic cop for his trouble, but it was the right thing to do.

All of which meant that Bucky had given himself permission to not be on duty during this dinner – he wasn’t going to try to glean more information about Tony’s operations or ask any probing questions so he couldn't make the conflict of interest any worse. Instead, Bucky could be nervous about the real matter at hand, which was that he was about to go on a date with a guy that Bucky liked way more than he should.

Not that it could go anywhere, Bucky told himself. He was still a cop, and Tony was still a crime lord, and he’d been lying to the man for months now. In any event, once he recused himself from the case, he would have to disappear from Stark’s life and reach completely; if he was being honest with himself, the smartest thing to do for his career would be to start looking for a new position outside of New York City right now, but he shied away from that thought for reasons he didn't want to think about too deeply.

But all of that was for future Bucky to worry about. For now, he was about to go out to dinner with a man who had been a runner up in _People Magazine_ ’s Sexiest Man of the Year contest multiple years in a row and who still made it onto the list of New York’s most eligible bachelors despite his “alleged” criminal ties. A man who liked chocolate chip cookies and fed bits of chicken to stray cats when he thought no one was looking.

Bucky blew out a breath and realized that he hadn’t brushed his teeth, so he got up and was headed for the bathroom when the buzz of his phone against the coffee table made him jump.

 _Here!_ The message came from an unknown number, but it had to be Tony. Bucky quickly swished some mouthwash and grabbed his wallet as he stepped into his shoes.

As soon as he got into the car he realized he had been so busy having a third-of-life crisis that he hadn’t even thought about where to go for dinner. “Hey,” he managed, feeling all of the excruciating awkwardness of a first date. Tony was dressed a lot like he had been earlier, with a suit coat over a plain shirt, but tonight it was black on black with a gleam of silver at Tony’s wrist. Bucky did his best not to stare but judging from the way the corner of Tony’s mouth was curling up, he probably failed.

“Hey, yourself, Blue Eyes,” Tony said. He gave Bucky an appreciative glance, lingering on his freshly shaven face, before he pulled away from the curb, which went a long way towards making Bucky feel less awkward. “You like Italian?”

“What’s not to like?” Bucky said philosophically.

“Good man,” Tony said. “My mother was Italian, so when I say this place has the best Italian food in the city, I know what I’m talking about." The drive went by quickly despite city traffic; Bucky asked about his mother’s family and in return got a ton of entertaining stories about Tony’s summers on his mother’s estate, including getting locked outside naked when a girl’s parents came home unexpectedly early. Soon enough they drove past a restaurant with people waiting outside, and Tony pulled around into the alley behind the restaurant that had at least four NO PARKING signs posted with a varying number of exclamation points and underlining. When Tony saw Bucky looking at one, he shrugged. “I don’t count,” he said, which Bucky could believe. They went in the back door of the restaurant and were immediately greeted by a smiling waiter, who escorted them to a private room where a table was set for two. The table was dwarfed by the space; this was clearly a room meant for a wedding or birthday party, but Tony must have reserved it just for them. The waiter took their drink orders (“Your usual, Mr. Stark?”) and as he left pulled a heavy curtain across the entrance to the room and the noise of the rest from the restaurant was muted. The lighting in the room was dim, the table was small, and the intimate feeling was exacerbated by the candle on the table.

Bucky started to say something about it, then realized he probably shouldn’t call attention to how romantic everything looked for the sake of his own sanity. He grabbed his menu and studied it, aware that Tony, having probably already memorized the menu, was studying him from across the table. “Are you going to judge me based on what I order?” he asked, meeting Tony’s eyes from over the top of the menu.

“Yes.”

“So it’s a test.” Bucky narrowed his eyes at Tony, as if trying to read his thoughts. After a moment, he folded his menu. “What do you recommend?”

Tony’s smile was blinding. “The eggplant rollatini with the tartufo for dessert.”

“Sounds delicious.” The waiter came back for their orders, bringing with him a bottle of wine that was so old its label was brittle and peeling away from the glass. He poured Tony a small amount, who tasted it and gave his approval, and then poured them both glasses. Bucky promised himself he would stop at the one glass – getting drunk tonight would be so stupid – but after he tasted the wine his conviction wavered. Whatever type of wine this was, even Bucky could taste that it was the Ferrari of booze. How often was he going to be wined and dined like this, after all? A bottle had what, like two glasses of wine apiece? He would be fine.

“So,” Tony said after the waiter left, crossing his arms and resting his elbows on the table. His eyes glinted with amusement. “Let’s talk about your five-year plan.”

Trying to smother a smile, Bucky crossed his arms as well. “Let’s talk about where you think your organization is going to be in five years, and I can tell you how I think I’ll fit into that plan.”

“Uh-huh,” Tony said skeptically. Then he sat up straight, cleared his throat and became what Bucky could only call Corporate Tony, face serious and tone strictly professional. “Well, I think this organization is best described as embarking on a period of rapid expansion while simultaneously consolidating the gains that we’ve made in the past few years. In many of our key industries we are working on horizontal and vertical integration in order to capitalize on economies of scale. Proceeds are invested back into the capital base and workforce, with the remainder being banked against future shortfalls. At the most recent shareholder meeting, members voted to waive the first quarter’s dividends in order to acquire assets for novel business ventures, putting us in a strong position for next year despite moderate economic headwinds.”

As Tony spoke, Bucky’s eyebrows climbed higher and higher. “Impressive,” he said. “You came up with that on the fly?”

“Well, I’ve been spinning bullshit to board members since I was old enough to vote, so I’ve had a lot of practice,” Tony said dryly, taking a sip of wine.

“Do you really have shareholders?”

“Yep. So many shareholders, for so many different businesses.”

“Is that-” Bucky was about to ask if the shareholder thing was related to the mysterious buy-in, but he reminded himself that he wasn’t working tonight. “Never mind. Well, the truth is, I don’t know where I’ll be in five years. The past few months have made me rethink a lot of things, and I’m trying to figure out my next step.”

“Oh?” Tony leaned forward again, gaze intent. “Want to talk about it?”

Bucky had self-preservation enough to know that talking about his crisis of conscience with the reason for that crisis was a bad idea. “Not just yet,” Bucky said. “I think…I think I need to figure out what I want, first.”

“Yeah, that’s usually a good first step.” Tony opened his mouth like he wanted to say something, but he closed it and took a sip of wine. “What would you like to talk about instead?”

The conversation paused as the server brought out an appetizer (“Courtesy of the Chef, he’s trying a new recipe”), the service amazingly fast given the crowd that Bucky knew was on the other side of the curtain. Guess that was one of the perks of dining with _the_ Tony Stark.

“Do you still have time to invent?” Bucky asked when they were alone again, scooping some of the appetizer onto his plate. Looked like calamari. “Like robots and stuff?”

Bucky could tell that he’d caught Tony by surprise with the question. “Someone’s been looking me up on the internet,” Tony accused with a smile, pointing his fork at Bucky.

If Bucky was a lesser man, he would have blushed – googling Tony Stark on his phone before going to sleep had become a guilty habit, from the early articles about him when his parents were alive to his college exploits to the frequent scandals of his twenties. Between all those, however, were periodic articles in scholarly journals attributed to “T.E. Stark” and more substantial think pieces in popular science magazines. “I like knowing who I’m working for,” Bucky said defensively, feeling the back of his neck get hot.

“Uh-huh. I do still tinker in my spare time, what I have of it,” Tony said. “Right now I’m working mostly in artificial intelligence. I have one, his name is JARVIS, that I’ve been tinkering with since college. I think machine learning algorithms are fascinating.”

“I read up about some AI initiatives when I was in the Army,” Bucky said. “For targeting and whatnot.” He had read even more about it once he became a cop, and he wasn’t at all enthused with the projects he’d heard about. “What do you do with it? Him,” he corrected.

“JARVIS helps me with work,” Tony said vaguely, fidgeting with his silverware before spearing a piece of calamari. “I got into AI when Stark Industries got awarded a cybersecurity contract. I kind of ran with it after we fulfilled the contract and JARVIS was the result."

Bucky almost dropped his fork when he got hit with a startling suspicion. _Helps me with work._ Was Tony’s mysterious accountant, that no one had ever seen or spoken to, that was able to hide his money from every regulatory body in the US government, an _AI?_ The implications were staggering, not just for the case but for the tech industry as a whole. Bucky covered for his stunned silence by eating, washing down the food he was barely tasting with expensive wine. The irony was not lost on him that he just had the biggest scoop of the operation so far, hours after he’d decided that he was quitting the case.

“So how about you? What do you do in your free time?” Tony asked, topping off their glasses.

Bucky stared at him across the table, brain blanking. It took so long for his brain to shift gears from thinking about JARVIS to trying to think of what he did in his spare time that Tony started to give him a funny look. “Uh, nothing special,” Bucky said after a minute. Googling his boss certainly wasn’t a hobby, after all. “After spending so much time in military cafeterias, I’ve been trying to get better at cooking. I work out, it’s a good release. Read. Visit museums when I can. One of my friends is trying to get me into indy games, but we can't play often.”

“That sounds nice. Gotta maintain that work-life balance, right?” Tony said. “Smart.” There was a soft chime and Tony pulled his phone out of his pocket. Bucky tensed; he’d forgotten about the raid until he saw Tony’s phone, having turned off his own ringer so that his notifications wouldn’t drive him crazy. He watched Tony’s face warily, wondering if the chime was related to the raid. Surely there would be a phone call, though? From his lawyer, or his security at the garage? But whatever the notification was, Tony just scanned it briefly and put his phone back in his pocket. “Sorry,” he apologized. “The boss is always on the job.”

“It’s fine,” Bucky said, smiling faintly, but the rhythm of the evening had been thrown off; thankfully their food came out and Tony got them back on track by asking about Bucky’s time in the Army, which got him on a roll of telling funny stories about the stupid things he’d seen as a sergeant. Turns out Rhodes, Tony’s right hand man, had been in the Air Force and Tony threatened to get him on the phone to defend himself against Bucky’s digs against the “chair force.” Before he knew it, dessert had come and gone, the bottle of wine was empty and their glasses had been replaced with tiny cups of espresso. The sound on the other side of the curtain to the rest of the restaurant had died down considerably, and the check had been dropped off so subtly that Bucky hadn’t even noticed it until Tony picked it up and put a healthy stack of bills in it.

“Want to go for a walk?” Bucky said impulsively, not quite ready for the date that shouldn’t be a date to end.

“Can’t,” Tony said regretfully. “No long walks for me anymore, not in the city at least.”

“Right.” Given the number of enemies Tony had, it was risky enough for him to be out without more protection than just Bucky without parading himself up and down sidewalks. “Guess its time to go home, then.”

“I could take you home, yes.” Tony said slowly, lining up the silverware in what Bucky realized was a show of nerves. After a moment he pushed them aside and met Bucky’s eyes across the table. “Or…”

Bucky’s heart leapt. “Or?”

“Or we could do something that we shouldn’t.”

Bucky’s breath caught in his lungs. There was a hopeful and hungry look in Tony’s eyes that made Bucky flush hot and then cold. It would be such a mad, bad idea to go to bed with Tony Stark; if he got caught, he’d go down in NYPD as the casebook example for how to fuck up an undercover assignment. On the other hand, tomorrow he would be requesting reassignment and would never see Tony again, so there would be just this one night. He could have that, right? Just one night for himself, this one selfish thing he could have before he left for good?

“Okay,” Bucky said. His heart was racing and he suspected if he didn’t have his hands wrapped around his empty espresso cup they would be shaking. “Tony, would you like to have another drink with me at my place?”

“I’d love to,” Tony said with a smile.


	8. Highs and Lows

The drive back was a study in anticipation. Feeling daring now that he had permission, Bucky trailed his fingers along the back of Tony’s hand and up his forearm as he shifted gears, sometimes circling Tony's wrist with his fingers; light, teasing caresses that earned him hot looks and made his pulse pound. In return, at stoplights Tony would take his hand off the gear shift and rest it on Bucky’s thigh just above the knee; Bucky held his breath each time, wanting his hand to slide further up, but all Tony would do is rest it there, the warmth and weight of it a promise for later while the curl of his lips said he knew what Bucky was thinking. Bucky, for his part, couldn’t keep his eyes off Tony. His gaze roamed from the beginning of crow’s feet at the corners of Tony’s eyes, down to the goatee that framed his wide, mobile mouth. Tony licked his lips, as if he could feel the weight of Bucky’s gaze, and Bucky had to swallow thickly. His eyes trailed down the line of Tony’s throat, to the shadowed divot at the base of Tony’s throat; Bucky wanted to put his tongue there and taste Tony’s skin.

When he found himself reaching for his seatbelt with the temptation to climb out of his seat and into Tony's lap, he finally had to turn his head to face the window, exhaling shakily. It had been a long time since he’d wanted anyone this badly. He wondered if part of it was that it had the thrill of the forbidden and had to admit to himself that that was at least part of it. The other part of it was the smug way Tony smiled when he admitted to screwing over some rich asshole, and the way his eyes had lit up when he made one of his friends smile, and the fact that Tony was, objectively, a goddamn good looking man.

Before he knew it, they were back at his place, and Bucky had to direct Tony to a spot where he wouldn’t get ticketed or towed. Tony put the car in park and turned in his seat to face Bucky. “Are you sure about this?” he asked. He reached out and ran his fingers over the curve of Bucky’s jaw, leaving heat in their wake. Bucky caught Tony’s hand and pressed a kiss to the inside of Tony’s wrist; he could feel Tony’s pulse pounding against his lips. “Yes,” he murmured against Tony’s skin and felt him shiver.

“Then let’s go upstairs,” Tony said roughly. “This car is too goddamn small for the things I want to do with you.”

Once inside, they barely took the time to kick off their shoes before they were reaching for each other, Tony cupping Bucky’s face in his hands while Bucky curled his fingers in Tony’s belt to pull him close. Tony was taking no prisoners with his kiss; he slanted his mouth across Bucky’s once, as a question, and when Bucky parted his lips in invitation he delved inside, tongue thrusting against Bucky’s. Bucky made a sound in his chest, deep and hungry, and turned them so he could press Tony against the door. This close, it was impossible not to notice how much taller he was than Tony, and he used that ruthlessly, crowding into Tony’s space as he let Tony take him apart with his mouth.

“Oh my God,” Tony muttered, pulling back so his eyes could rove over Bucky’s face, pupils blown. Bucky took advantage of Tony’s distraction to shove Tony’s suit jacket off his shoulders, tossing it in the direction of the couch. Underneath the jacket Tony’s shirt was t-shirt soft, and Bucky ran his hands over it, enjoying the feeling of soft cotton over hard muscles, before he slid his hands underneath. He felt and heard Tony’s groan as his hands found warm skin, making him greedy for the other noises he could coax out of him. Tony's breath was warm pants across Bucky’s mouth, and Bucky pressed one more hard kiss to his lips before he was kissing along Tony’s jaw and pressing his teeth against Tony’s neck. He straightened just long enough to pull Tony’s shirt off, skating his hands along the ladder of Tony's ribs, curling them over the smooth curve of his shoulders. Tony’s hands, meanwhile, had been busy on the buttons of Bucky’s shirt, and he swept the plackets aside to put his hands on Bucky’s chest.

This time it was Bucky’s turn to moan. “Bedroom,” he said as Tony ran thumbs over his nipples, and put a hand inside the waistband of Tony’s slacks to pull him deeper into the apartment. On the one hand, he wanted to take his time, but on the other, he felt like he might shake apart if he didn’t feel Tony’s body against his own _right now._ As Tony captured his mouth again, Bucky made short work of Tony’s belt, making another sound deep in his chest as his finger brushed over the hard line of Tony’s erection. Tony inhaled sharply and stilled as Bucky explored him through the soft fabric of his pants, cupping and squeezing.

“You drive me crazy,” Tony groaned, pulling Bucky down for another kiss with one hand while the other unbuttoned Bucky’s jeans, sliding his hand inside. Bucky felt his knees get week at the touch and wanted to thrust against the sweet, hot pressure. He felt the thrill at the base of his spine that said he was well on his way to coming and the surprise that he was already so far gone made him pull back with a huff of laughter. He rested his forehead against Tony’s and sucked in a few deep breaths, trying to calm down.

“I don’t want this over too quickly,” he said when Tony looked at him with a question in his eyes.

“No," Tony agreed. His eyes roved over Bucky's chest and down to where he was measuring Bucky’s length with his hand. As Bucky's hips flexed into his touch, he said, a little breathlessly, “We can go twice?”

“And that’s why you’re the genius,” Bucky said, and kicked off his pants as he let Tony push him onto the bed.

* * *

As the early morning sunlight started to spill over the horizon, Tony fell into his own bed with a heavy sigh. After being with Blue Eyes, he was excruciatingly aware how cold his sheets were and how empty the bed. He'd made the insanely risky move to stay as late as possible before leaving because it felt so good to be in Blue Eyes' bed, to have another warm body pressed against his own, relaxed and comfortable in the soft darkness of a shared night. After showering and falling back into bed, they had talked for a while, Blue Eyes lazily drawing patterns on Tony's back until he'd started getting drowsy. Leaving had been difficult; he’d tried to extricate himself without waking Blue Eyes up, but the man slept too lightly and had reached for him when he felt the bed move. He'd insisted on walking Tony to the door to say goodbye, which had happened eventually after another long makeout session that might have turned into more if the sky wasn't already starting to get light. It had started with Tony ruefully running fingers over the beard burn he'd put on Bucky's throat and making the joking offer to kiss it better; Blue Eyes' gaze went heavy lidded and dark, and he'd said "you promise?" in his rumbling, sleep-rough voice. The kisses they shared were long and languorous, a far cry from the eager urgency of last night. Having to pull away from that and leave the apartment to face the chill of predawn had been jarring and demoralizing, particularly when the knowledge that that night could never happen again was a lead weight in his stomach the whole ride home. 

Rolling over onto his back, Tony threw an arm over his eyes and made a disgruntled sound. If Rhodey found out where he’d been all night he’d curse up a blue streak, starting with “he’s technically your employee” to “he’s probably a cop” to “it might have been a setup” while hitting “you don’t even know who he really is” along the way. Tony couldn’t regret it, though, not when it had been the best night he'd had in years. 

He reached for his phone and pulled up the text he'd sent to Blue Eyes earlier; his thumb hovered over the keyboard as he fought the impulse to write something. What would he say though? _Thanks for a great night, but we can't do it again?_ Surely Blue Eyes knew that as well as he did, he had a lot more to lose than Tony if they got caught. _I miss you already?_ _Can't wait to see you again?_ No need to twist the knife for either of them. 

After a long minute he put the phone back down with a sigh and stared at the ceiling as the sky grew brighter. It was going to be a long day.

* * *

The next day, even though he had been awake when Tony had left in the dim hours of the morning, Bucky was still sad to wake up alone. Tony had said goodbye like he’d known it was the last time they would see each other, and it had made Bucky’s heart wrench as he’d closed the door behind him. He’d stood there for a long moment, head resting against the door, before he’d gone back to bed. The sheets had still smelled of sex and Tony, and even though he had hours to go before he was supposed to get up, the heaviness in his chest meant it took a long time for him to fall back asleep.

As the alarm on his phone trilled at him, Bucky hit snooze and rolled back over, planting his face in the pillow that still held traces of Tony's cologne. One night was apparently enough to instill a Pavlovian response and he spent a few moments daydreaming wistfully of what it would be like to have morning sex with Tony. Before he could really get into it, however, his phone trilled again, reminding him that all the problems he'd left for Future Bucky were rapidly becoming problems for Right Now Bucky.

“Fuck,” he groaned out loud, then he rolled over and grabbed his phone. As he started coffee and breakfast, he forced himself read through the notifications he’d been ignoring all night. The highlight, of course, was from his handlers on Discord: _Great party! Guest of honor never showed tho, bummer. Maybe next time_. 

“Next time,” Bucky read out loud, and sighed. He banged his head against his kitchen cabinets. If he’d thought it through before he’d panicked yesterday, he would have realized that his half-baked plan to protect tony was even dumber than it appeared. Even if he stayed, he couldn’t protect Tony forever; his handler would get suspicious that Tony was slipping through their hands every time. And Tony was far from stupid; once he found out his garage with all of the stolen cars had been the subject of a police raid, he’d be thinking of people who had known about the cars and had been acting suspiciously, and Bucky’s impulsive date night was a huge red flag. He knew Tony wouldn't hurt him if he found out that Bucky was a cop, but imagining the look of betrayal on Tony's face made him feel sick. He closed the app and opened up his text message from last night; it was foolish to think that Tony would have texted him already, or even at all, but he still stared at the phone with disappointment. After a few moments, he deleted the number and set his phone down with a sigh.

"It's going to be a long day," he said to his empty kitchen. 


	9. Revelation

Since he knew he wouldn't be coming back to this apartment, provided as part of his cover, he packed up everything he couldn't bear to lose. There was one goodbye that he wanted to make before he disappeared, even though he knew it was risky. He was going to miss KT; ironically, he was the best partner Bucky had ever had and he would consider him a friend if it hadn't been for all of the, you know, lying. As he walked to his usual morning meetup, he had been thinking of various ways to say he was leaving and coming up with reasons why when he realized that there was a tall skinny black guy standing in KT’s spot, looking at his watch like he was waiting for someone.

“Blue Eyes?” The man said, looking up at Bucky, and Bucky nodded. “I’ll be working with you today, name’s John Johnson.” As Bucky stared at him in disbelief, the man sighed. “I swear to God I was born with it. Just call me JJ.”

“Ok. So where’s KT?” Bucky asked, and his stomach dropped when he saw the grim look on the man’s face.

“You didn’t hear? KT got shot last night on his way home from work,” JJ said, voice tight with anger. “Shot twice in the back. Cop said it was self-defense and that he had meth on him. He’s in intensive care right now.”

“Are you fucking kidding me? Meth? No way,” Bucky said, stunned. “That’s bullshit.”

“Oh, we know. Clearly a setup. The Boss just found out about it this morning and he is livid.”

Bucky started to ask if they knew who did it, but then his thoughts flashed back to what he’d told Stark weeks ago: _those two won’t give up until they get back at the person who embarrassed them._ And he knew exactly what had happened. “I want to see him,” Bucky said.

“Who, KT? They are only allowing family, which, you know,” JJ grimaced. “He doesn’t really have.”

“Right.” Bucky paced away, scrubbing his hands over his face. “What’s Stark doing about it?”

JJ shrugged. “He did say that no one was to go after the cop though. No vigilante shit. He was going to take care of the bastard himself.”

Bucky stared out over the street, busy with morning traffic. Where a few minutes ago there had been resigned determination, there was a big empty space; he'd felt nervous before but now he was completely calm. The top of his head and the tips of his fingers felt hot, though, and he knew that this calm wasn't going to last. “I gotta go,” he said, turning on his heel.

“You dodging out of work? Boss ain’t gonna like that!” JJ called after him as he strode away.

“Tell him he can’t fire me, I quit,” Bucky called back, not missing a step. He was halfway down the sidewalk when someone grabbed his arm and pulled him up short.

"Boss said you and KT were tight and warned me you might do something foolish," JJ said. "He said you needed to trust him to make it right."

Bucky shrugged off JJ's arm. "I'm not going after the cop that did this," he said impatiently. "Not yet, anyway. This is personal."

"Whatever you say, man," JJ said, holding his hands up and backing off. 

The calm lasted for the whole trip back to his home precinct, but behind it he could feel his anger building. It was a brittle, temporary, _dangerous_ sort of calm, like the way that water drained away from the beach before the tsunami hit. He threw open the doors to the building and strode up to the desk officer. 

"I need to talk to Captain Pierce _right now,_ " he said evenly, and the desk officer frowned.

"He's not-"

"Tell him it's Detective James Barnes, and it's about Tony Stark," he said. "He'll make time for me."

He crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows, making it clear that he had no intention of moving until the desk officer did what he asked. Sure enough, he watched as the officer made a phone call, then buzzed him in to the bull pen. He made his way through the officers without acknowledging any of the greetings from the people he knew, too intent on reaching Pierce. When he got to his captain's office, he had enough self control to close the door firmly instead of slamming.

Pierce frowned at him. "Barnes, what the _hell_ are you-"

"What in the hell were Officers Rumlow and Rollins doing in Stark's territory?"

Pierce's eyebrows drew together. "What?"

"Last night, Rumlow, maybe Rollins too, shot my primary contact in Stark's organization _in the back._ So I'm asking you: what. _T_ _he fuck._ Were they doing anywhere in that borough, much less that neighborhood?"

"Watch your tongue, Barnes," Pierce rumbled. "I don't answer to you."

"Fine, I'll tell you. It was a hit," Bucky said bluntly. "The guy who was shot is the one that humiliated Rumlow on camera a few months ago. Remember? Went viral on TikTok and the department had to issue a press release about it? He should have lost his badge for that, but instead he was back out on the streets and looking for revenge!" Bucky realized he was shouting as Pierce's face grew even darker. 

"You better be careful what you say, son. Rumlow said he was responding to a call and the suspect was acting erratic, like he was high, and got violent. Rumlow defended himself."

"That's bullshit! I want to know why he was cleared for active duty!"

Pierce stood and slammed his hands down on his desk. "You need to calm the fuck down. For your information, there was a hearing, the union got involved, and the panel decided there wasn't any evidence of wrongdoing. He was cleared for active duty two weeks ago."

Bucky gaped at that, speechless. "No evidence of wrongdoing? He was caught _on camera_ soliciting a bribe and demanding sex from prostitutes! And now he tried to murder someone! What is the department going to do about this?"

"There were no witnesses, and Rumlow said he was defending himself," Pierce said again, enunciating carefully so that Bucky would get the message that the conversation was over. "Unless you have evidence to prove otherwise, there's nothing _to_ do about it."

"Then I quit."

It was Pierce's turned to be stunned speechless. "Quit? You can't quit, you are in the middle of the highest profile investigation this precinct has ever been a part of!"

"This precinct, and the entire NYPD, can go fuck itself," Bucky bit off. "I refuse to work for an organization that tolerates rapists and murderers like Rumlow."

Bucky turned and left, swinging Pierce's door open hard enough that it slammed into the wall and bounced off. The silence of the bull pen as he stormed out was satisfying; he wanted to yell and kick things and cause general mayhem but had too much dignity to make an ass of himself. He got back out on the sidewalk and took a deep breath of cold fall air, feeling like a weight had fallen from his shoulders. He put his hands in his pockets and felt his phone, which, like the apartment, had been provided for the assignment. He took it out and scrolled through the coded notes and surreptitious pictures he'd taken, weeks worth of information on Stark's network. It wasn't the same kind of hot lead like the information about Tony's AI, but it was still more bricks for the case the feds were building against Tony.

Bucky turned it over in his hands thoughtfully. Then he threw it under the wheels of a bus as it pulled up to curb, smiling when he heard it crunch, and started making his way back to Manhattan.

* * *

“Hey, copper,” Tony said warily, after his guards waved him through. The garage was echoingly empty, cleaned out of even the tool cabinets and work tables. Tony had been sitting at a card table frowning over a laptop when Bucky came in. "JJ said you quit." 

“First, I’m _not_ a cop,” Bucky said with emphasis. "But I might know some stuff that a cop could theoretically know, if you're interested. Second, I did quit. I don't want to be your employee anymore," he said, willing Tony to understand what he was trying to say. "I'm a free agent now. Third, I'm in. _All_ the way in. I wanna hear about the buy-in."

It took a moment for Tony to realize what he was trying to say, but once he did a smile bloomed on his face. "So you figured out what you wanted?"

"Yeah," Bucky said softly, echoing the smile. "Yeah, I did." He leaned over the table to kiss the smile on Tony's face -

"Oh _hell,_ no," someone barked from a few feet away. Tony jumped and immediately looked guilty; Bucky looked up and saw Rhodes coming towards them, looking thunderous. "What did I say, Tony?"

"Rhodey, honey bear," Tony started, scrambling to his feet. "Listen-"

"I said _don't sleep with the undercover cop,"_ Rhodes said, pointing a finger at Tony. " _Don't._ " 

"Yes, I know, but-" Tony started to retreat in the face of Rhodes' righteous fury.

"Wait, you knew I was an undercover cop?" Bucky said in disbelief.

They both stopped and stared at him, then glanced at each other. "Well, yeah," Tony said slowly. "I even said so when we first met."

"But - but," Bucky sputtered. "But you let me work for you!"

"Yeah?"

" _Why?_ " 

At this point Tony looked at Rhodes for reinforcement, but the man shook his head and backed away. "I'm not getting in the middle of this."

Tony turned back to Bucky. "Well, I, um..."

"Thought you were cute," Rhodes called out from across the room.

"I thought you weren't getting in the middle of this!" Tony shouted back. Bucky was staring at them with a sort of bemused hysteria. This whole time, Tony knew he was a cop? And hung out with him anyway? _Slept_ with him anyway? He couldn't decide if he should be flattered, furious, or shake Tony for being so goddamn reckless, an impulse he shared with Rhodes apparently. "Seriously, though," Tony said, face sober. "I had a good feeling about you, and I wanted to keep an eye on you."

Bucky narrowed his eyes at him. "You took me to the Policeman's Ball," he accused.

Tony laughed and then had the grace to look abashed. "Yeah." 

"Keep your enemies close, is that it?" Bucky said with a snort, trying to smother a smile. Tony looked so earnest it was hard to be mad; after all, Tony was right, he _had_ pegged Bucky for a cop from day one, Bucky was the one who assumed he must have been joking. 

"You're not supposed to keep them _that_ close," Rhodes said, and they both turned to glare at him.

"Let's have a fresh start," Tony said, returning Bucky's smile. He held out his hand. "Hi. I'm Tony Stark."

"James Barnes," Bucky said, shaking his hand. "My friends call me Bucky."


	10. Epilogue

"I feel like you're going to try to sell me a time share," Bucky said, studying the bland conference room Tony had reserved. It looked like probably every other conference room Bucky had ever been, as if they were all ordered out of the same catalogue; beige walls, carpeted floor that had the feeling of being beige while actually having flecks of red and blue in it, and the tables and chairs with wheels on them so they could be moved easily. Tony had even pulled down a screen and to all appearances, was setting up for a powerpoint presentation. 

"It's all about presentation, Mr. Barnes," Tony said. He picked up a clicker and a red dot appeared on Bucky's chest, then started moving around in what Bucky eventually recognized as a heart shape. "Gotta know your audience and what they'll respond to. Too fancy, and they'll be scared off. Not fancy enough, and they'll feel like they're being scammed. A hotel conference room fits neatly inside that middle ground."

"You've put a lot of thought into this," Bucky said. He glanced at the clock, saw that they had a few minute before people were supposed to arrive and dipped his head for a quick kiss. 

"Well, yeah," Tony started, but then there was a knock on the door. Tony opened it to see that part of the security detail started bringing in the refreshments for the meeting, coffee and donuts and croissants and other breakfast-style food that people would probably pick at and leave mostly untouched. "Natasha helped," he continued, poking at the refreshments table and rearranging everything slightly. "She's better at that side of things, the headology, as she calls it."

"I can see that." Bucky watched Tony putter. Looked like Tony was nervous, which was kind of adorable. "So you can't even give me a sneak peak at what you're talking about today?"

Tony shook his head. "For right now, you're a potential investor, not my lover."

"Ok, ok," Bucky said. He realized he was following Tony around as he puttered and made himself stop. "So I got to see KT today. Brought him his laptop so he could start catching up on homework."

That made Tony stop and turn to Bucky with a smile. "Good! So that mean's he is doing well?" 

"Yep. Any update on Rumlow?"

Tony's smile turned evil. "From what I hear, he's had a run of bad luck lately, such a shame. He lost his service pistol, which, you know, big no no. And did you know someone stole his patrol car, spray painted it, and left something unmentionable smeared on the seats? Then did the same with his personal car, which was found laying upside down in front of his apartment building?"

With a force of effort Bucky kept his face blank. "Strange."

"Very strange," Tony agreed. "Insurance didn't even pay out, mysteriously enough. Apparently they had dropped his coverage the day before and he hadn't gotten the notice yet."

"Crime in this city is getting really out of hand," Bucky said seriously, face very serious. "He's lucky it wasn't something worse."

"Oh it will be, give it time."

There was that smug look again that Bucky loved, and he started to sneak another kiss when there was another knock. This time the security guard was escorting people inside, a middle-aged Black couple that looked around cautiously, like they were expecting the conference room to contain something nefarious. Bucky straightened immediately, trying to look professional, and smiled at them as Tony welcomed them inside, calling them by name and offering them a warm handshake. There was a steady stream after that, until the conference room was about half full. 

"Hello everyone, let's get started," Tony said, taking a head count and looking at the clock. "All of you are here because you either were recommended by a friend or a family, or I sent you a personal invitation. Thank you for being willing to join me today for this presentation, and please save your questions for the end. As you all know, my name is Tony Stark, genius billionaire playboy philanthropist, and in this presentation I'm going to ask you for money." Tony grinned as almost everyone laughed. "Then I'm going to tell you what you're going to get for your money, and then I'm going to explain how you're not even going to notice that your money is gone." 

As interested as Bucky was in the presentation, he kept getting distracted by watching Tony effortlessly charm the room, making eye contact with each person and joking just enough to keep people interested without derailing his speech. It was a warmer, more authentic show than what Bucky had seen at the Policeman's Ball and it made Bucky's heart turn over with affection as he watched. KT had been right when he said that the buy-in speech could make you a believer; not just in the astonishing amount of benefits that Tony offered to people who agreed to the buy-in, but because Tony's enthusiasm for the project was contagious. 

"So why do you need _our_ money?" One guy interrupted. "If you've got so much of it?"

"Good question," Tony said. He leaned against one of the tables, putting his hands in his pocket and crossing his legs at the ankle. "Yeah, the majority of the start-up money came from me. Since this organization is technically a nonprofit, I get to write it all off of my taxes, the way rich people often do. But I ask for _your_ money because if I paid for all of it, then it would belong to me, wouldn't it? The whole point of this enterprise is to build ownership and equity in the community. _You_ own the health clinic and the child care centers, the retirement homes and the apartment complexes. Not only does it mean you get to decide what to do with them, but it means that you start having a place at the same table that all of the billionaire developers and well-connected real estate moguls do."

"But the stuff about the taxes and stuff, where we just hand it all to you, that's tax fraud, isn't it? Which is illegal?"

"Well, yes, in a way," Tony said honestly. "You avoid paying taxes the same way rich people avoid paying taxes, by finding loopholes in the tax code and driving semi-trucks through them. But also, I'm the criminal, not you. If we get caught, I'm the big bad con artist that scammed honest folks like you out of your hard earned savings. There will be a class action lawsuit after the criminal proceedings, my lawyer will fight hard but not too hard to defend my assets, then they will eventually get divided up among all my victims in the kind of feel-good, good guys win story that is made for Hallmark TV. In the meantime, my job is to help the community fund the type of social welfare projects that the government should be doing but isn't, by taking from people who don't deserve it and giving it to the people that do. Which the government should also be doing but isn't." 

"So this is like, socialism," a young woman said in accented English. "Instead of paying the government taxes, we give that money to you, and you like, do all this stuff with it."

"Pretty much. Grassroots socialism with a capitalist veneer. I like to think of it as stone soup, from the kid's story."

"But why?"

"Because it's the right thing to do," Tony said, like it was obvious. Bucky hid his smile in his hand and hoped he didn't look too besotted; he'd sat all the way in the back for a reason. "I don't know else to say it. Why should I have so much when others have so little? I give a lot it away, because there really are so many problems that can be solved by throwing money at them, but some can't. Some need systemic change, which means empowering people, which is what I'm trying to do. That's why it's a buy-in, and not a handout." There was still some obvious reluctance among the group, and Tony's smile turned a little sad. "Look, I get it. You are used to people promising a lot and not delivering. And you think this sounds way too good to be true, right?" No one really answered, but the way they kind of avoided Tony's eyes said a lot. "Let me tell you a story.

"So I've been donating regularly to the free clinic on 17th for a while now. A few years ago, there was a kid volunteering there because he wanted to go to medical school. But he was in a shit position - his parents made too much money to qualify for the grants and needs-based scholarships, but not enough to actually afford tuition or even qualify for good student loans. So the doctor in charge of the clinic emailed me and told me to do something useful with all of the blood money I was getting from Stark Industries, and so I did. I paid for his entire education, and he came back and is currently the head physician at the rehab clinic. So if you want there to be a catch, if you _need_ there to be a catch so that you can believe what I'm telling you, then that's the catch - you have to try to give back at least as much as you were given."

There was a long, thoughtful silence after that, and Tony wisely let it sit for a while instead of trying to fill it with words. "You don't have to answer now," he said. "The forms that you would need to fill out for the buy-in are right here," he added, tapping a stack of papers next to him. "Take one with you, and think about it. Any last questions?"

"Yeah, I got one," the young woman said. "I heard you stole Jeff Bezos' car, is that true?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BTW KT makes a full recovery and becomes active in efforts to overhaul the NYPD while he finishes his degree in social work. Tony gets involved in the reform process and starts forcing people out of the police union and the NYPD leadership to make way for people who are interested in changing the system. This process is hastened by the fact that whenever the city has to pay out in civil lawsuits related to police misconduct, the police pension fund happens to mysteriously lose value by the exact same amount; someone somewhere makes the connection before the pension fund is entirely depleted and police misconduct cases start to drop off dramatically.
> 
> Rumlow is eventually found in a compromising position with a sex doll on the police commissioner's desk and is fired, then later turns up in Vegas having apparently gambled away all of his life savings and his personal possessions. He ends up sleeping on a bench in Vegas, hassled by cops, and the life lesson there entirely escapes him. He spends the rest of his life calling up his old police buddies from NY and anyone that will listen (no one) that he didn't do it (he didn't) and it was a conspiracy to ruin his life (it was) and that Tony Stark was to blame for everything (he was, and Tony made sure every cop in NYC knew it). Rollins, apparently smarter than his partner, moved to LA after their patrol car was stolen and vandalized the second time and worked blamelessly there for many years before retiring to Mexico.

**Author's Note:**

> So I based a lot of Tony's persona here on Russian organized crime, which often blurs the line between legitimate and illegitimate activity, and the most powerful people in organized crime are often politicians and businessmen. For a fascinating look at Russian organized crime and organized crime in general, I suggest Mark Galeotti's book "The Vory."


End file.
